


Human Rhapsody

by Syntania



Category: Shall We Date?: Obey Me!
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-08
Updated: 2020-07-30
Packaged: 2021-03-01 00:06:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 22,875
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23065945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Syntania/pseuds/Syntania
Summary: If you suddenly find yourself inside of a romantic sim dating game, how do you manage to win the game if you are nothing like the normal protagonist?
Comments: 12
Kudos: 121





	1. Is This The Real Life?

**Author's Note:**

> Contains text/spoilers from the game.
> 
> Rated teen and up for some bad language and a little innuendo.
> 
> This is my first submission to this site, so please forgive me if I mess up the formatting.
> 
> This is a WIP. I'll post chapters as I finish them.
> 
> I always welcome ideas and constructive criticism. Please feel free to share if you'd like.
> 
> I'm thinking about a possible reformat and condensing chapters so there aren't so many of them.

It started out like any other day. I woke up in the afternoon, fed the cat and bunny, made myself a cup of coffee and sat down on the living room couch. I work overnights, so by the time I wake up, it’s close to evening. I plugged my phone into the charging cable there and opened my favorite mobile game, _Obey Me! One Master to Rule Them All._ After taking a couple of sips of my coffee, I got up again, going into the kitchen to hug my husband. He was in the process of getting his lunch together for work. 

“Hi, honey.” I said, giving him a kiss. “Hi.” He said back, returning my kiss and hug. We were then interrupted by my son bursting into the kitchen. “Mom. We’re out of lunchmeat. Can you get something besides bologna?” 

I arched an eyebrow. “You finally get sick of bologna? You’ve been eating bologna sandwiches for like the last 2 years now.”

He dropped his head. “Yeah.”

“Well, what do you want? Ham, turkey, roast beef?”

“Anything’s fine but bologna.”

“Ok, write it on the whiteboard on the fridge. I’ll pick it up later.”

“K, I’m going to need it for lunches.” He threw his arms around me, giving me a huge rib-cracking hug and a kiss on the head, as he’s almost a foot taller than me. “Love you, mama.” 

“Oof.” I returned his hug. “Love you too, son.” With that, he dashed back into his room.

I gave my husband a bemused smile. He just shook his head. “Oh, the kitty’s come up closer. I got her to go under the table,” he told me. My husband is an animal lover, and he enjoys feeding the stray cats in our neighborhood. One he’s been trying to lure so she’ll trust him. He wants one of her kittens as he thinks she might be pregnant.

“Oh, cool, honey.” I smiled. “Well, I’m going to go into the living room now to enjoy my coffee.”

“Ok,” he replied. “We’re going to be leaving soon.” My son and husband work at the same warehouse on the same shift. Since my son doesn’t have a driver’s license yet, he rides with my husband. I settled back onto the couch to enjoy my coffee and my game. I keep the sound muted so the sounds of my 2D anime husbandos telling me the name of the game don’t arouse any suspicions. I had just gotten the game to load to the home screen when they were leaving for work. I got up, gave both a hug and kiss and we said our goodbyes. As soon as they left, I picked up the phone again. The mail icon had a red “!” notification by it. I thought, _Oh, more AP I hope, or some other goodies._ I opened the “app” and read the title of the notice.

SPECIAL OFFER! EXCLUSIVE NEW REDUX PLAYTHROUGH FOR VIP MEMBERS ONLY!

 _I..what?_ I got really excited. I had completed the main story, normal and hard with all 3 stars. I was really sad when I had seen the “CAST” list at the end of chapter 20. I had just gotten into the game and spent way too much money on it to have it end here. Now, there was a new playthrough? “Yesss!! Sweet!!” I hissed out loud. Gleefully, I pushed the big red “START” button in the notification. The phone’s screen went white, then black. There was only a little “loading…” icon in the bottom right corner. _Great, now what?_ I thought. _The app’s crashed?_ I looked at it again, and I started to feel odd. I scrunched my eyes together a couple of times as my vision began to blur. _Something’s not right._ Clutching my phone in my hand, I detached it from the charging cord and stood up to go get myself a drink of water. As soon as I stood up, I knew something was wrong. I felt extremely dizzy. I immediately got a headrush that collapsed my legs from under me. I felt myself falling and put my arm out to catch myself. But my arm passed through where I thought the floor would be. I was falling. Panicking, I began to flail. I heard myself screaming. Everything had gotten dark. I began to cry. I was confused, scared, had no idea what was going on. Then, dark colors started to whoosh by me. I started to come to the realization that I was going to die.

Out of nowhere, my fall stopped. I found myself lying on a floor, uninjured. I blinked a few times, trying to focus my vision. 

_Where am I?_

The place I was had very little light, but enough that once my eyes adjusted, I could see where I was.

_Holy shit. This is the RAD council room from the game. What the fuck is going on here?_


	2. Is This Just Fantasy?

I tried desperately to make sense of what was going on. Then I heard the voice. A low voice, but soft. I knew I’d heard the voice before.

“Welcome to the Devildom…hold on just a minute.” I turned to look at the source of the voice. Tall, tanned, auburn hair, golden eyes, fancy red uniform. Yep. This was definitely Diavolo. He was looking at me with a very confused look on his face. “You are not what I expected.”

I was a consummate smartass, and I could feel the words coming with little power to stop them. “Oh, you didn’t expect a middle aged redheaded lady wearing sweats and a t-shirt? What a shocker. Let me guess, you were looking for a pretty young teenage anime protagonist? Sorry to disappoint.” _Shit! Why did you say that? You know who you are talking to, and you are going to get yourself killed!_ I sighed, pulling myself to my feet. If my smart mouth was going to get me eaten by demons, I would at least like to die on my feet.

Diavolo just stared at me blankly for what seemed an eternity, then suddenly burst out laughing.

“Ah! That was funny! What a quick wit!” I breathed a sigh of relief. “However,” his face became stern. “Be careful who you speak to in that manner. Not everyone is so forgiving.”

I gulped. “I’m sorry. I tend to say stupid things when I’m nervous, and sarcasm is my default. It won’t happen again.”

He nodded, smiling again. “Think nothing of it. So, you are…Syntania?” He read from a form in front of him.

“Yeah, well, Syntania is my online nickname, my real name’s Melissa. You know, that will probably be confusing, as you have got Syntania on the forms….Yeah. Yes, I’m Syntania. That’ll work.”

He continued. “Syntania. As a human, it will probably take a little while for you to adjust to things here in the Devildom.” _You can say that again,_ I had to keep myself from muttering under my breath. He continued, “I suppose I should start by introducing myself. My name is Diavolo. I am the ruler of all demons, and all here know of me. And someday soon, I will be crowned king of the Devildom.” I made a mental note to ask him what the holdup in that was when I was sure that he wouldn’t rend me into shreds for asking. I made myself giggle slightly when I thought, _I have to get my intimacy level higher with him._ He must not have caught me giggling as he continued. “This is the Royal Academy of Diavolo, though we just call it RAD.” _You named the school after yourself? Ooookaaay…_ “You’re standing inside the assembly hall, the very heart of RAD. This is where we officers of the student council hold our meetings and conduct our business. I’m the president of said council.” He paused as if awaiting my response.

“Uh, so, I’m here why, exactly?”

From off to the side, I heard another voice. “I will explain everything to you.” Lucifer! He was more or less my favorite, even though it was hard to choose. I could feel my face redden. _Ugh, seriously? Stop acting stupid!_

Diavolo continued. “Syntania, this is Lucifer. He is a demon and the Avatar of Pride. He’s also the vice president of the student council and my right hand man…and not just in title, I assure you. Beyond that, he’s also my most trusted friend.”

I snickered again. _Suuuuuuure. Y’all are gay for each other, just admit it. It’s cute._

“Flattery will get you nowhere, Diavolo.” Lucifer shook his head, then turned his attention to me. “Speaking on behalf of the entire student body at this great and storied school of ours, I offer you a most heartfelt welcome, Syntania.”

_Oh, here we go._ I thought to myself. _It’s just like the game-in-a-game in this game. Maybe I have to win to get out of here, or at least survive. Ok, time to impress Lucifer._

“Other students? There’s more?”

Lucifer explained, “Diavolo believes that we demons should start strengthening our relationship with both the human world and the Celestial Realm. As a first step towards this goal, we’ve decided to institute an exchange program.” _Odd name for a kidnapping, but whatever._ “We’ve sent two of our students to the human world and two to the Celestial Realm. And we’re welcoming four students to our school; two from your world and two from the Celestial Realm. So, I take it you’ve probably put two and two together at this point, right?” _Yeah, two plus two equals cheese…_ “You’ve been chosen from among the people of the human world to participate in this program of ours. You are our newest exchange student. Your period of stay is one year. You will have to work on the tasks that you receive from RAD. After one year, you will write a paper about your exchange here in the Devildom.” _I’m good at writing papers so that’ll be a cinch._

“What sort of paper? Essay, report, what?”

“I am not telling you to write a doctoral thesis. You can take it easy.” He could tell I was a bit annoyed at all this. “Don’t glare at me like that. It’s not like I will abandon you all by yourself here in the Devildom. You need someone to look after you, and I think that someone should be my brother Mammon.” _Yeah, wait until he gets a load of me._ “He’s the Avatar of Greed and…how should I put it…? _A thieving scumbag? I know that’s what you want to say…_ “Oh well, you’ll understand soon enough.” He handed me the D.D.D. As I took it, I realized that I had somehow lost my own phone. _Crap._ “Here, take this device. It’s called a D.D.D. It’s a lot like the cell phones of your world. This will be yours to use for as long as you’re here.” _Yay, this is going to be a huge help. Not._ “Now, go ahead and try calling Mammon with it.” _Yep, he’s going to love getting a phone call from an absolute stranger, a mere human nonetheless. Dis gon’ be gud._ I touched the “phone” icon and selected Mammon’s contact. His picture popped up, a candid selfie with Asmo photobombing. Figures that he’d want to be in the photo. A couple of rings later, and he answered. “Yoooo.”

“Uh, hi.”

“Huh, Who the hell are ya? You ain’t Lucifer.”

“I’m a human.”

“Whaaa? A human? Geez, I was gettin’ all chilly here thinkin’ it was Lucifer again. Ya should have told me right away. So, what business does a human got with THE Mammon?

_Gotta love that humility._ “Apparently you are going to keep me from getting eaten for the next year. Great, huh?”

“No way! There’s nothin’ in it for me. Whaddya even mean by ‘keep you from getting eaten’? AAH! I get it now, you’re the other human – the new exchange student! G’luck with that, and see ya.”

_Time to drop the bomb, pal._ “Lucifer called for you.”

“Pfft, whatever, Ya think THE Mammon would listen to ya just ‘cause you’re tryin’ to scare me with that name?” _Yes. Yes, I do._ I put the D.D.D. on speaker and held it towards Lucifer. “He said no.”

Lucifer scowled. “You’ve got 10 seconds…9…8…”

“YESSIR!” came booming through the phone, then a soft click as he hung up.

Lucifer smiled, obviously reveling in Mammon’s fear of him. “I trust you had a nice chat.”

I shrugged. “I would have preferred you, Lucifer.”

“You look even more worried now, huh?”

Diavolo interjected. “Well, if you were suddenly brought to a strange place and then get told that an unfamiliar face will now take care of you, you’d certainly feel anxious. However, Mammon isn’t the only one to help you out. Now then…we still need to introduce our new friend to your brothers, Lucifer. And it’s probably better that you do that instead of me, wouldn’t you say?”

Lucifer sighed. “Yes…As much as I dread the idea of doing so, you’re right.”

A voice like a song piped in. “Oh, come now. Really? You should be honored that you get to introduce such a sweet and charming little brother like me!” 

Lucifer pointed over to Asmo. “This one here is Asmodeus. He’s the fifth eldest. He is the Avatar of Lust.” 

Asmo pouted. “Wh…I can’t believe you just totally ignored what I said! And not only that, you referred to me as ‘this one’. How rude!”

Another voice chimed in. “Hmph. At least he didn’t ignore you altogether. How do you think I feel?”

Lucifer continued. “That one there is Satan, the fourth eldest of us. At first glance, he may seem like a responsible demon with a good head on his shoulders, but looks can be deceiving.” _Projecting much, Lucifer?_

“Aha,” Satan muttered. “So, I’m that one, am I? Nice to meet you, Syntania. I am Satan, the Avatar of Wrath.” Satan extended his hand, which I shook. “Nice to meet you as well.” _Satan reminds me of my husband John. They both have a volatile temper but are huge animal lovers._

Lucifer spoke up. “It basically sums up what he’s all about. He may flash you a pretty smile, but you had better be careful because it is all an act.” _Gee, now why does that sound so familiar?_

Satan frowned. “If you continue saying such nonsense, you’ll just scare Syntania.” _Too late._ “Don’t take him too seriously, Syntania. Lucifer enjoys speaking ill of his brothers. He is the Avatar of Pride, after all.”

Lucifer sighed. “Are you done?” He went on. “Now, the one there with the very grumpy look on his face is Beelzebub. He’s the sixth oldest.” _Kind of reminds me a little of my son Alex. Beel’s taller, and definitely in better shape, but that sweet smile and the mop of reddish hair…_

“Lucifer, I’m hungry.” _Sounds like Alex too._ I smirked.

“That’s too bad. Now behave yourself.”

Beel nodded at me. “I’m Beelzebub, the Avatar of Gluttony.”

“So,” Lucifer said. “There are seven of us brothers in all, and I am the eldest. My other brothers aren’t here at the moment, but…well, we can get to them later. All in good time.” _Yep, because Levi is holed up in his room playing video games just like Alex, and Belphie is locked in the attic, but it’s whatever._

Diavolo spoke, “During your stay in the Devildom, the seven brothers will lend you their strength.” _Good, cuz I’m gonna need it._ “To keep you safe, you are to stay with them at the House of Lamentation.”

“To keep me safe, huh?” I sighed. “Good luck with that.”

My comment made Lucifer arch an eyebrow, then he spoke. “Most agree with Diavolo, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t vulgar demons out there who wouldn’t harm you.”


	3. Caught In A Landslide

Lucifer continued. “Well, you’ve got that done now,” About this time Mammon entered the room, huffing and panting. “And it seems the idiot has arrived as well.”

Mammon came to a screeching halt in front of me. “HEY! Just who do you think you are, human? You’ve got a lotta nerve summoning the Great Mammon!”

I arched an eyebrow. “I didn’t. He did.” I pointed at Lucifer. “And the name’s Syntania, not ‘human’, unless you want me to start calling you ‘demon’.” I folded my arms across my chest, brave on the outside, thinking _I’m gonna die I’m gonna die I’m gonna die._

Mammon ignored me and continued. “Listen up, because I’m only gonna say this once. If you value your life, then you’ll had over all of your money now! And anything else of value, too!”

I was done. “Joke’s on you, pal. I got zapped here without even my purse, and the only thing I have of value on me is my wedding ring, and you’ll have to get that over my cold, dead corpse.” My bravery was bolstered. I will die before I give him my ring.

I think he finally heard me. “WHAT?! That’s it, I’m gonna wipe that stupid, happy-go-lucky look right off of your face…by eatin’ you! Startin’ at your head and working my way down, until-“

I was REALLY done now. _I’m going to die, so whatever._ “Try it, buddy. I’m old and fat, so it’s gonna be like chewing on a bit of gristle! I’m gonna make sure to give you heartburn!” I leaned forward and tilted my head upward, getting right in his face.

I think he was about to do it when I heard Lucifer yell. “Mammon, shut up or I’ll punch you! Syntania, you too! You’re not helping the situation!”

Mammon and I both jerked backwards away from each other. It was a good thing that I backed up, because Lucifer hauled back and punched Mammon anyways. I could only stand there and blink in surprise.

“GAH! OWW! Hey, what’s the big idea?! I thought you were actually gonna give me a chance to shut up before punching me!”

I think Satan noticed my discomfort and walked over to me. “Syntania, Mammon here is the Avatar of Greed. He governs and oversees all forms of it. Whenever he takes a liking to someone, they suddenly find themselves awash in money. But from what I hear, if he decides to break it off with someone, that wealth evaporates. They’re left without a Grimm to their name.”

I turned to Satan. “Yeah, well, he still can’t have my wedding ring.” I muttered, holding my ring with my other hand, spinning it on my finger out of anxiety.

Asmo added, “And he’s also a masochist. That part’s important.” _Cool, then just get me a bullwhip and we’ll get along just fine._

Lucifer nodded in agreement. “Indeed. And it just so happens I have a job for my masochist of a brother.”

Mammon protested, “Y’all, stop telling lies! I ain’t asked for that punch and I AIN’T a masochist!” I couldn’t help but guffaw, clapping my hand over my mouth to muffle it as much as possible.

Lucifer glared at Mammon. “Mammon, you are going to be in charge of seeing to her needs during the whole exchange.” This made me smirk a bit. “I expect your full cooperation.”

“What?!” Mammon stomped his foot like a little kid. “Why me?!”

“Aw, lucky you, Mammon! I’m so jealous…” Asmo piped up.

I side-glanced Asmo. “Of what? Seriously? Have you seen me?”

Mammon grumbled, “All right, then why don’t YOU do it, Asmodeus!” 

“Okay.” I started to walk over to Asmo. Then he shook his head. “What? Hell no, too lazy.”

I dramatically dropped my head and pouted. “Aww.”

Mammon continued, “I thought you said you were jealous of me?!”

Satan interrupted. “Just give up, Mammon. There’s no getting out of this. You know you can’t refuse a direct command from Lucifer, correct?”

Mammon began whining. “But why does it have to be me?! What about Beel? Why can’t he do it?”

I said quietly, “Because he WILL eat me, fat or not.”

Asmo seemed to agree. “This isn’t a job we can entrust to Beel. We might as well ask him to eat her.”

I had to add, “And I am not crunchy or good with ketchup.”

Beel commented, “Mm, yeah, I can’t promise I wouldn’t.”

My eyes widened a bit and I purposefully took a LARGE sidestep away from Beel.

Mammon threw his hands in the air. “You’re useless, you know that?!”

Lucifer had walked behind Mammon. “…Mammon?”

Mammon jumped as he didn’t apparently notice Lucifer behind him. “..Wh-what?”

I swear I could see smoke emanating from Lucifer. “Surely you’re not going to tell me that you object to this arrangement, are you?”

Mammon stood bolt upright with a start. “Ugh…I hate you guys! Every last one of ya!” He groaned. “Fine…FINE! I’ll do it, okay?!” He stomped back over to me, getting in my face again. “All right, **human** ,” He put emphasis on that word purposefully. “Listen up. As much as I don’t want to look after you. I’ve got no choice. It’s a huge pain in the ass, and I’m too important for this kind of thing, but Lucifer told me to do it, so I will. But in return, you better make sure you don’t cause me any trouble, got it?!”

I put on my best, ‘ain’t taking no shit’ face, and crossed my arms on my chest. “I’ll stay out of your way if you stay out of mine.”

“Good, that’s what I want to hear. As long as you do as I say, we won’t have any problems.”

I groaned. “Just try to manage to keep me alive for this year. And I am not gonna be your personal servant or anything, so don’t get any dumb ideas. I’ll do what you say as long as it keeps my ass intact, capiche?”

Mammon just glared at me while Lucifer continued. “We have decided who will take care of you, so on to the next subject: your tasks.”

Now I was confused. _So, in the game, there are cards, and dance battles, and all that. How exactly is this going to translate into sort-of-real life?_

“Your task is to polish up your soul nicely and to acquire the power to resist demons.”

 _Huh? Well, I’m a ginger, so I don’t have a soul._ I internally laughed at my own dumb joke. _But polish up….what the fuck is he on about?_ At this point I kind of tuned him out, demons like humans with shiny souls, blah, blah, blah. I never realized just how ridiculous this part of the story was. _I don’t give a flying fuck about souls or whatever. Who wrote this? Maybe something got lost in translation? I just want to find a way to get back home. Great. I’m the mobile otome game version of Sam Beckett. Let me leap on outta here. I miss my family already…_ I tuned in again long enough to hear the explanation of the tasks. 

“You won’t have to do these tasks on your own. After all, blah blah magic.” _Geez, Lucifer, this is worse than sitting through lectures in college!_ “We’re lending you our power.” _Wait, what? Ok, well, little do they know that I’m a witch. However, if I gain a demon’s power…_ The possibilities were running through my head. _But do the spells I know work here? How? Ugh. I’m going to have to find some books or something._

Then something snapped me back to reality. “Syntania, are you listening to me?”

My eyes widened as I stared into the face of a very annoyed Lucifer. _Shit!_ “Uh, sorry Lucifer, I know this is all important and relevant information, but this whole situation, you know, I’m just a little flustered. Please, continue. Tasks and stuff.” I made circles in the air with my hands as I talked.

He continued, “Everything you need to know is on your D.D.D. There’s a ‘to do’ list with the tasks that you’ll need to complete and the rewards. Open it now and take a look.” 

I pulled out the phone and stared at it. _Yeah, it looks like the interface from the game. Ok, open ‘to do’, and…wait. It looks different. It’s a game?_ I was thoroughly lost at this point. I had to ask.

“So, my tasks are to complete this game? This is how I earn Grimm?”

Lucifer glared. “If you had been paying attention, you would have known. It’s an app that allows you to earn real Grimm by not only playing the games, but you assign the Little D’s that you can earn to perform tasks for you like working jobs. The Grimm you earn will be deposited into your account. The items you earn in game are to help boost your in-game cards as well as energy and gifts for the Little D’s. You’ll have to complete those tasks as well as your schoolwork to succeed this upcoming year.”

“Oh, okay.” I nodded. _Well, I know this game, so this ought to be easy._

“With that, my explanation has come to a close.” _Who the fuck talks like that? Really?_ “But to sum it up for you, You will be an exchange student here at RAD for one year, and you must do your tasks. Your tasks consist mainly of the dance battle game, and as you have no cards yet, we will lend you a hand. If you want to use our power, you will have to use the special cards that you summon through the app called Nightmare. And, when your exchange period comes to an end, you are to submit a paper about your stay here in the Devildom.” _If I were to write it right now, it would be 5 to 7 paragraphs of ‘I’d like to go home now please.’_ “It’s as easy as pie, don’t you think?”

I sighed. “Yeah, a big piece of nails and broken glass pie.”


	4. No Escape From Reality

Most of what was being said from this point on was just a blur. Mammon bitching about taking care of a mere human, Beel saying he was hungry, Lucifer and Diavolo going on about whatever. I never imagined that I would start to hate this game. 

“Could someone just show me to my room, please?” I moaned. Mammon grabbed my upper arm and yanked. “This way. And try to keep up! If you fall behind and get yourself eaten, it ain’t on me!”

“Hey!” I yelled, wrenching free from his grip. “Try to be a little gentler, wouldja? I mean, you could at least be polite and ask me to follow you instead of trying to yank my arm from its socket!”

He just glared at me. “Fine. Follow me, **please.** ” He made sure to give me a wide grin on the word ‘please’, so I would get a good look at his pointed teeth. 

I said nothing, just followed him. _I am stuck here, so I have to make the best of it._ All the while we walked to the House of Lamentation, Mammon went on and on about how he didn’t have to do this, he wasn’t afraid of Lucifer, and all I could think was, _Sure, you’re scared shitless of him. Stop being a baby and admit it._

“HEY! Are you listening?”

“Nope.”

“Come on! Even if you WEREN’T listenin’, you could at least pretend that you were! Ugh, whatever. Let’s move on.”

We finally reached the House of Lamentation, which I’m just calling the HoL from now on. Mammon began telling me all about the HoL, as exposition warrants, but since I already knew about it, I just looked around as he spoke. It looked even more grand than the picture in the game, like an old mansion. I looked forward to being able to explore it when I got a chance.

“GRR!” I heard him growl. “Y’know, human, you got a really bad habit of not listenin’ to people when they’re tryin’ ta tell you important stuff!”

I looked at him and narrowed my eyes. “You were telling me about the House of Lamentation, which is the RAD dorm for all of the student council members. Diavolo has his own castle, and you seven brothers live here along with me, now. There’s a bulletin board over there with a job flyer that will help me earn Grimm if I get a part-time job. It’s mostly either retail, warehouse work, or hospitality jobs, none of which I’m very happy about but if I need the money, then so be it. Oh, and you’re a real big shot here and everyone kisses your feet, et cetera. Is that about the long and short of it? Can I go see my room now?”

He just grumbled, “Yeah, guess you were listenin’. Now, I’m gonna give you a piece of advice, so listen up…”

I didn’t let him finish. “If it looks like a demon is about to attack, run. Or else, I’m gonna die. I figured that part out already.”

Mammon was about to say something when a voice came from behind us. “How about this? I vote for YOU to die, Mammon.”

Mammon and I spoke at the same time, “D’ah…! Levi..”

“…Uh, l-listen up, human! This here is Leviathan, the Avatar of Envy. He’s the third oldest of us brothers. Since his name’s sorta hard to say, you can just call him Levi.” _Weird, Leviathan’s easy to say. Beelzebub’s name’s harder…_ “Okay, then let’s move on.”

Levi interrupted, “Mammon, give me back my money. Then go crawl in a hole and die.”

I rolled my eyes. _Wow, déjà vu. How many times did I hear this scenario? I’m over it._

“Levi.” I said matter-of-factly. “How much does Mammon owe you?”

“Wha….?” Both of them said in unison, looking at me incredulously.

“I said,” drawing out my words for more emphasis. “How. Much. Does. He. Owe. You?”

Levi stammered. “Uh, it was 2000 Grimm.”

“Fine. I’m going to speed things up a bit.” I turned to Mammon. “I am going to get a job and do my tasks to earn Grimm. Once I earn that money, I am going to pay Levi back what YOU owe him. When I do that, you, Mammon, will make a pact with me.”

Both Mammon and Levi were speechless, staring at me with mouths opening and closing like a fish’s.

Mammon began to sputter, “I…but…..huh?”

“Look.” I said, pinching the bridge of my nose. “We both know that you have no intention of ever paying him back. If I can get you to make a pact with me, it’ll guarantee my safety. Your fear of Lucifer will only go so far. So, doing this is in my best interests. You,” I pointed at Mammon, “will no longer owe Levi any more money until the next time. You,” I then pointed at Levi,” will get your money back so you can buy whatever anime series you wanted. And I,” pointing at my own chest, “will get through this alive so I can go home to my own family. Everyone wins, yay!” I threw my hands up in the air, then turned to Mammon. “Now……can we PLEASE go to my room?”

_I am seriously about to have a nervous breakdown._

Levi turned to Mammon. “Where’d you get this lady?”

Mammon just sighed, “New exchange student. Lucifer put me in charge of her.”

“Student?” Levi raised an eyebrow. “She looks kind of….well, old….to be a student.”

I looked over to Levi. “You do realize technically you are all way, way, WAY older than I am, right?”

“Good point.” Levi said.

“At any rate, you’re never too old to learn. I just got my associate’s degree six months ago, so I’m actually kind of interested to see what sort of things I’ll learn here.”

“Pff, normie.” Levi scoffed.

_Oh geez, here comes the mom voice._ “Now, look here. I’ll have you know that I am NOT a normie. I watch a little anime, not much, admittedly, but I have seen the first season of _Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure_ and _One Punch Man._ Oh, but my favorite one is _Cells At Work!_ It helped me a lot in school. I also like the works of Junji Ito, but that’s more horror manga. But I’m primarily a gamer. PC, I prefer MMORPG’s. I’ve played _Everquest, World of Warcraft,_ uh…I’m playing _Neverwinter_ right now…”

Mammon’s eyes glazed over. “I have no idea what yer talkin’ about right now.”

Levi, on the other hand, was staring at me in amazement. “Whoa….so you like anime and games? Really?”

“Yeah.” I nodded. “I have been playing video games since they looked like a square and two rectangles. I practically grew up in arcades. I’m a bit old-school, admittedly, but I like the newer games too. Just not that great at console games. But I’m willing to learn.”

“Wow! Hey, come with me then! I want to show you my collection!” Before I realized, Levi had grabbed my wrist and was trying to drag me off. As we started to move, Mammon grabbed my other wrist and started to pull me the other way. “No way, Levi! This is my human! Get your own!”

“Ow. Ow. Ow! OW! GUYS, STOP! YOU’RE HURTING ME!” I screamed. I felt like I was going to be ripped apart right here in the entrance hall. Both of them immediately let go of me.

I panted. “Ok, look. Levi, I’ll come see your stuff later. Promise. Right now, I’m tired, and I just want to go to my room for a bit. Mammon, please take me there.”

Levi pouted a bit but turned to go to his room. I heard him mutter, “It’s not fair. Mammon gets a cool human, and he’s a lousy, greedy scumbag. Everyone always gets better things than me…”

Mammon started walking up the stairs and down the hall, and I followed. “Yeah, that’s telling him, human.” he chuckled. 

I shook my head as we walked. “Just please shut up, Mammon.”

“Hey!” he looked at me angrily. “Watch how you’re talkin’ to me! You keep forgettin’ that I’m a demon! I could eat you real easy!”

“But you won’t. Lucifer and Diavolo would come down on you like a ton of bricks.”

“No way, I’m not scared of either of ‘em!” He stopped at a door at the end of the hallway. “This one’s yours.” He opened the door and held it for me. I walked in and looked around. It was even more beautiful than the game art. I inhaled sharply. “It’s lovely! Oh….” I smoothed my hand over the bed, grinning like an idiot. Then I noticed Mammon still standing in the doorway. “You going to come in, or what?” I shrugged. “I don’t bite, unless you like that sort of thing. Come to think of it, you probably do…er…Just get in here, please?” _Another joke fail. Wow, many impress, such amazeballs._ I frantically waved him in.

Mammon disgruntedly came into my room, shutting the door behind him. “Whaddya want, human?” I took a deep breath and began. “Look. Neither one of us asked for this, but here we are. I know that you’re like a bazillion years old, so one year is probably just a drop in the bucket, but it’s a big deal for me. If we are both going to hold onto the last remaining shreds of our sanity, we should agree to try to get along until I am permanently out of your hair. Who knows, maybe we’ll even become friends. Truce?” I held out my hand in anticipation.

He stared at my outstretched hand for what seemed to be an eternity, then he grinned, and shook my hand. “Truce. But ya need to be more respectful. I AM the Great Mammon, after all!”

I just laughed. “Of course, Mr. Mammon, sir. Whatever you say, master.”

He nodded. “Yeah, that’s more like it.” I don’t know if my sarcasm was lost on him, or he actually found it charming.

“Hey, Mammon?” I had one more thing to say.

“Yeah?”

“I just wanted to say thanks. I know the last thing you wanted to do was to babysit some mere human, but I wanted to let you know that I appreciate it.”

“Uh…” I think I caught him off guard. “You’d better be grateful that I’m wasting my time on the likes of you.” _There’s that narcissist we all love._ “And, yer welcome.” He nodded, and I thought I saw the faint hint of a smile. “See ya.” He said as he walked out my door, leaving me alone with my thoughts.

I took a better look around the room. There was a wardrobe and a dresser, and I suddenly realized that I had literally nothing with me. Literally all I had was the clothes on my back. Maybe once I earned some cash, I could go shopping. I opened the wardrobe, and the sight within shocked me. Several school uniforms hung there, shirts, jackets, skirts, pants, ties. Shoes lined the floor, a pair of sneakers, two pairs of mary jane style flats and a pair of plain boots. Along with that I found some basic clothing, t-shirts, jeans, a couple of skirts, a bathrobe. Turning to the dresser, I opened it to see some plain white cotton nightgowns and underwear, a couple of bras, socks in black and white. I shut the door and walked into the bathroom. Along with the towels and washcloths, there were basic toiletries; soap, shampoo, toothbrush, comb, anything I’d need. _Wow. They thought of everything. Nice._ I went back into my room and examined the desk. There was everything I’d need for school, along with a decent laptop. _Well, maybe this won’t be so bad._


	5. Open Your Eyes

It was getting late, so I decided to take a quick shower and get to bed. I normally worked the overnight shift, but if I had to go to school in the morning, I was going to need to try to sleep at night.

I crawled under the covers. The bed was incredibly comfortable. _This should be easy to get to sleep._

Boy, was I wrong. I lay there, staring up at the ceiling trying to doze off. As I lay there, my body suddenly felt as if I was dunked in ice water. I was jolted completely awake by a terrible thought.

_Oh no…I may have royally fucked up. At this point in the game, Mammon runs off and Levi recruits me in a scheme to find Mammon’s credit card. That’s what prompts the pact, but I derailed that. What if I just messed up my chances? Do I try to get the story back on track, or do I hope it runs linearly and proceeds as it should regardless of what I do? I can’t assume that will be how it goes. I think I need to get the story back on track. I’ll still pay off Levi, that’ll give me leverage with Mammon. I also need to do something about the credit card. Hopefully that seals the deal with Mammon. But, if Levi is warming up to me already, how do I do the thing with the TSL contest? That has to figure into it somewhere…ARGH! What do I do? Ok, let’s think about this. First thing’s first, I should get that card. It’ll be my plan B, because I don’t think owing me a favor will be enough to make Mammon have a pact with me, even if I do get Lucifer and Levi in on it. Then I can get Mammon to help me with the TSL contest. That should rectify things. I hope. So, since I can’t sleep, should I go and get it now? I run the risk of running into Beel, and he might eat me. But, I need to run into Lucifer before that to get the info regarding the card, because that figures into his intimacy level later. Ok, I go talk to Lucifer tomorrow about the card. I gotta get to sleep so I don’t doze off in school._

The first day of class I was walking up the stairs, when I heard two voices. I tried to ignore them, but I heard one say something about “the human that everyone’s talking about.” I froze. _They’re going to try to eat me. Nopeing on out of here._ Without even thinking, I ran up the rest of the stairs and down the hall, away from the voices. As I ran, I passed a figure in the hallway. I stopped when I heard him say, “Hey, you there. That’s right, I’m talking to you, the human with that frightened, tormented look on your face that demons love so much. You’re practically screaming, ‘Come and eat me! I’m scrumptious!’ Your name’s Syntania, isn’t it? This D.D.D. here belongs to you, right? I saw you drop it just now.” He handed it out to me. “Here, take it.” 

_Oh, shit, it’s Solomon!_ I came to a complete stop. “Oh, hey. Sorry, I was too busy running for my life to pay attention to my looks. Yeah, that’s me. Thanks.” I took the D.D.D. out of his hand and looked at it. Good, not cracked.

I decided to have some fun. “You’re Solomon, right? The other human student? The sorcerer, made pacts with 72 demons? I guess that was why you were chosen to come here, you already know your way around.”

He looked taken aback. “How do you know all that?”

I grinned. “You aren’t the only one who knows a thing or two.”

“Hm.” He smiled and nodded. “Perhaps you aren’t as helpless as I first thought. I mean, you’ve got Mammon looking after you, right? Not exactly the best candidate for that role, so for Lucifer to choose him to do that, he must be messing with you. Sounds like you are going to be okay.” A bell rang in the distance. “Uh oh, I’d better get going. See you around, Syntania. Take care of yourself.” He turned around to leave, as did I. I stopped and looked around. _Wait, where am I? Which way’s the classroom? I got turned around when I started running….Shit._ I turned around and found myself face to face with Lucifer. “Uhhhh…..” I froze.

“Good morning, Syntania.” He smiled warmly. “You’ve become quite the celebrity here, haven’t you?”

“I, uh, guess.” I shrugged.

He nodded. “I hope you got a good night’s sleep. You look more relaxed.” _Funny, I don’t feel it. I’m a big raging ball of anxiety at the moment._ “Was that Solomon you were just speaking to?”

“Yeah.” I nodded. “He’s the other human student here, right?”

Lucifer agreed. “Yes. I should warn you, it’s fine if you associate with him, seeing as you’re both human, but know that he can’t be trusted.” 

I couldn’t help but have a skeptical look on my face. _Pot calling the kettle black, here._

Lucifer continued. “He may be a mere human, but he has a ring imbued with power, and he wields powerful magic. He’s the type of man who will try to subjugate even a powerful, greater demon if he gets the chance.” _He would do it for personal gain. I would do it just to stay alive. Oh, wait! The card! I should ask him about the card!_

“Oh, by the way, Lucifer, I’d like to know a bit more about Mammon. If he’s going to be my keeper for a year, I should at least try to learn something about him.”

Lucifer sighed. “He is my brother. I don’t want to say anything unkind about him. So, I’ll be sparing in my criticism.” He cleared his throat and took a deep breath. “He’s pure scum. The scummiest sort of scum. Pure, unfiltered, disgusting scum to the point that I’m embarrassed to call him a fellow demon, much less my brother.”

I just blinked. “Well, don’t hold back, tell me how you really feel.”

Lucifer chuckled. “So, any particular reason you asked, or were you just curious?”

“Just curiosity.” I shrugged, trying my best to be casual. “So, he’s all about money, right? Avatar of greed and all that.”

Lucifer nodded in agreement. “Regardless of the form, as long as he has money, he’ll spend it. There are no limits with him. So, in order to impose limits of my own, there’s a certain form of money that I’ve **frozen** in his case…” Lucifer made certain to emphasize the word “frozen”. _Slick. Real slick. You may have well said, ‘Oh, go get his credit card, I hid it in the freezer.’_

About that time the class bell rang. “Class is about to start. Time to get going. You’d better hurry too, you don’t want to be late on your first day here.”


	6. Look Up To The Skies And See

After class, I returned to my room to drop off my stuff. I completed my homework then went downstairs for dinner in the dining hall. Dinner was difficult; it was all Devildom food. It was either volcanically spicy which I couldn’t take, or just odd. I made certain to not ask what anything was, because if I knew I could not eat any of it. I picked at what was there and ate what I could, which wasn’t much. I could hear my stomach growling almost as loudly as Beel’s. After dinner, I returned to my room to wait for nighttime. I was bored out of my skull. My studying was done, and I had nothing to do. I scoured my room looking for something but found nothing. I changed into a t-shirt and jeans and left my room, hoping to find something to occupy myself. Then I had a thought. _I need to bring Levi into this in order to fit the story. Maybe this is my chance. But which room was his? None of them were labeled. I just have to try random doors and hope for the best._ I picked the first door I came upon and knocked. A voice rang out from the other side.

“Come iiiin! ♪” _Asmo. Damnit._ “Uh, sorry about that, Asmo. It’s me, Syntania, the human? I’m looking for Levi’s room. Do you know where it is?”

“Well, come in, silly! I’m not going to talk to you through the door!” He sounded oddly happy about the fact it’s me. Taking a deep breath to steel my resolve, I opened the door. _Whoa._ I looked around in amazement. His room was beautiful. “Amazing.” I couldn’t help but say.

“Hmhmm, I know I am.” Asmo’s voice snapped me back. 

“Oh, yes, of course Asmo. You’re quite beautiful. So is your room. I absolutely love roses. They’re my favorite.”

“You can come in, you know. You don’t have to stand in the doorway.” I didn’t realize that I hadn’t moved.

“Oh, yeah, sorry.” I walked in and closed the door.

“What did you want with Levi? All he wants to do is play video games and watch anime.”

“It’s a thing. I need to talk to him about something. I can’t really go into it right now.”

“Aw.” Asmo playfully pouted. “You won’t even tell me?” _Damnit, he was too cute._

I chuckled at his playfulness. “Don’t worry, you’ll find out soon enough. How do I find him?”

Asmo was sitting at his vanity. He was wearing a pale pink robe, and as I spoke, he started rubbing lotion on his legs. I decided to be respectful and not look.

“Why are you looking away? It’s okay, you can look.”

“I would, Asmo, but I shouldn’t.”

“But why?”

“Don’t get me wrong, you are quite attractive. If I looked for too long, I’d probably attempt something stupid. But I’m happily married, and I don’t want to do anything that is going to jeopardize that.” The thought was making me a bit depressed. _Married or not, every woman likes to feel attractive, and being rejected by the very embodiment of lust would really wound my ego._ Instinctively, I wrapped my arms around myself. “Besides, even if I wasn’t married, I know you wouldn’t be attracted to me, so it’s okay. If you could just tell me where to find Levi, I’ll be out of your way.”

“Oh…” Asmo said. “But you still think I’m attract….what’s that?”

“What’s what?” I looked around me, puzzled.

“On your left shoulder? Under your sleeve?” He pointed to where he had indicated.

“Oh, that? My tattoo? It’s a tribal style scorpion in red and black, because I’m a Scorpio.” I pushed my sleeve up to show him. It was my first and only tattoo, a birthday present to myself.

Asmo gaped. “Tha-that’s my symbol. The scorpion. And you like roses like me. Hmm..” He seemed to be thinking about something.

 _I’m not sure that I like where this is going._ “Uh, look, if you can just tell me which room is Levi’s then I’ll be out of your hair.”

“Oh, yes, it’s down the hall to the right, second door. Are you sure you don’t want to stay here a bit longer?” _Oh, nonono…is he flirting with me? Yeah, no. Who are you kidding, dumbass? Of course he’s not flirting with you; he’s not drunk._

“Sorry, I have things to take care of right now.” I smiled as politely as I could to hide the growing awkwardness. “Maybe some other time.” I didn’t allow him the chance to say anything else as I rushed my ass out the door as fast as I could.

Breathing a sigh of relief, I headed over to Levi’s room and knocked on the door. “Levi? Levi! Hey!”

Levi threw open the door. “Oh, hey, human. What is it?”

“Would you mind if I came in? I have an idea about how to get your money from Mammon.”

Levi’s eyes widened. “You do? Come in.” He moved from the doorway to allow me inside. Once I got to see Levi’s room, I was truly amazed. All these guys had beautiful bedrooms. Levi’s was like an aquarium. “Wow…” I whispered. “I love what you’ve done with the place.”

“Huh?” Levi sounded a bit confused. “I thought you said you had an idea about Mammon.  
“Oh, yeah, right. Look. I happen to know that Lucifer confiscated Mammon’s beloved credit card, Goldie. I also happen to know where it is, I just need your help in getting it.”

“Huh-wha?” Levi stammered. “How do you know all that?”

I waved him off dismissively. “I just do. So, will you help?”

Levi grumbled. “Well, I do want my money back, and if you know about Goldie and where it is, maybe you’re on to something. Okay, where is it?”

“We have to go to the kitchen. Most likely Beel’s there, and if I went alone, he’d most likely have me for a midnight snack. I need you there to keep me from getting devoured.”

“The kitchen?” Levi blinked. “Okay.”

We crept down to the kitchen and sure enough, Beel was there. He hadn’t seen us yet, and I waved Levi on. He shook his head no. I gave a puzzled look, and he just pushed me ahead, into the kitchen.

“Hey, human. What are you doing here?” Beel glanced over at me.

“Um, I was hungry.”

Beel smiled. “Me too. Oh, but there isn’t anything in the fridge. I ate it all already.”

“Oh, well, maybe there’s something in the back of the freezer. Hey, I think Lucifer has a poisoned apple in his desk in the study.”

Beel blinked. “Oh, I think you’re right. I’ll go look. Bye, human.”

I waited until Beel had left, and waved Levi to follow. Slightly annoyed, I said, “Why didn’t you come with me? You were supposed to protect me!”

Levi scoffed. “And let me be seen with some normie! Pfft.”

“Uh, I told you I’m not a normie.”

“They don’t know that.”

I just rolled my eyes. “Come on, help me look in the freezer.” We started digging through the built-up ice. After a minute, we found the card. It looked like Lucifer had put it in a container of water and froze it into an ice block, the put the block in the freezer. It reminded me of one of those freezing things in a block of ice pranks.

“Wow,” Levi marveled. “Lucifer was really serious about freezing it! How do we get it out, thaw it in the microwave?”

“No!” I put my hands up. “You could melt the plastic, plus start a fire because of the metal in the card, not to mention you could erase the magnetic strip. Our best bet is to run it under warmish water. It’ll take a while but it’s the safest.”

“A while?” Levi said. “Have you seen the size of that block? It’ll take millenia!”

“Well,” I said, looking over the block. “Maybe if we chipped off some of the ice it’ll go faster. See if you can find a meat tenderizer mallet, or an ice pick or something.”

We had almost gotten the card free when Mammon entered the kitchen. “Hey, what are you two doing in he-Goldie?! Is that my Goldie?! Hand it over!”

Instinctively I grabbed the card, clutching it to my chest, trying to ignore the cold wetness spreading across my shirt. “On two conditions. One: You have a Seraphina figurine in your room. It’s still in the bag from the store and buried under some trash. You will find it and give it to Levi.” I turned to Levi. “I'll get you your money too, don't worry.” I turned back to Mammon. “Two, make a pact with me, and I’ll give it back.”

“Figurine, wha? What figurine?” Mammon looked very confused.

“Wait…how do you know about that figurine, human? She’s buried under some trash?! Mammon, you threw trash over the High Elf Queen? AGH!” Levi’s face reddened deeply.

“Calm down, Levi. We’ll get the figurine back. First. I want that pact, Mammon.”

“Right, a pact, fine. I’m more than happy to do whatever you….wait, why?”

“I have my reasons. They’ll make sense. Just make the pact and you get Goldie back.”

“Oh, no way! Nuh-uh! I’m the Great Mammon, the Avatar of Greed! One of the Seven Rulers of the Underworld! I’m not letting some human boss me around!”

“Oh, okay, then I’ll just go give this to Lucifer and tell him that I found you trying to thaw it out.”  


“Oh yeah? So what if I just eat you and take the card?”

“Ok, you do that, then you can explain to Lucifer and Diavolo why you singlehandedly decided to sabotage the exchange program. I’m sure Diavolo will adore hearing about you destroying his pet project.” I laid the sarcasm on thickly as possible.

“I mean, of course I’ll make a pact with you! I’d be thrilled to!”

Begrudgingly, Mammon took the oath. I breathed an inward sigh of relief. “Ok, let’s go to your room, Mammon.”

He threw his hands up defensively. “Hey, whoa whoa whoa! I mean, I know I’m THE Mammon, but so soon? You work quickly.”

“I…” I paused a moment. “…Really? No, I don’t want to fuck you. We’re going to get the figurine for Levi. Come on, Levi. Let’s go.”

We entered Mammon’s room. “Ok, it’s under a pile of trash on the floor. Let’s start looking.”

“I still can’t believe you treated her with such disrespect, Mammon.” Levi grumbled.

“Found her.” I held up the figurine. “Good news, Levi, She’s still in the packaging, and it’s pretty clean. At least he kept her in the bag.” I tossed the figurine to Levi who cradled it lovingly. “Ohhhh….Seraphina! I’ll make sure you get treated with the proper respect that you deserve!” Levi dashed off, presumably to his room to find space on his shelves for her.

“Well, ya got what you wanted, human. You got your pact. You happy?”

“No.” I stated. “I’m not home and I miss my husband and my son. So, I’m not happy.”

Mammon’s expression changed slightly. He almost looked sympathetic. _No, I’m seeing things. Why should he care?_ “Give Levi his money back. That’s an order. I’m going to my room.” Without giving him a second glance, I returned to my room. I sat on the bed, staring at the wall for what seemed an eternity.


	7. I'm Just A Poor Girl

_I can’t take this. I can’t wait around and just see how things play out. I have to speed up the process. It’s a risk, but at this point, I don’t think I have a choice._ _I have to go to the attic._ I rose from my bed, and quietly left my room. I started down the hall, looking around until I could find the stairs to the attic. I tried to go up the stairs as quietly as possible to not attract attention. I still had a bad feeling that I’d run into Lucifer. My fears were realized.

“What are you doing, Syntania?”

“Good evening, Lucifer. I’m just trying to acclimate myself with the house by exploring.”

“I see.” Lucifer nods. “I would recommend that you not attempt to go up there again. It’s dangerous for humans. You should return to your room. It’s late.”

I decided not to press the issue for now. “All right.”

Lucifer nodded in approval. “That’s the answer I wanted to hear. I hope you mean it.” He turned to leave, and I decided it would be prudent to return to my room for now....for about an hour or two. As soon as it became very late and I was certain that everyone was asleep, I left my room and crept out into the hall. My inner clock hadn’t completely shifted yet, thankfully, so I wasn’t drowsy. I made my way to the attic stairs and crept up them quietly. At one point, I could feel what could be best described as a wall of hot air that made the hairs on my body tingle. _That must be the magical barrier._ Being that I was human, I was able to pass through it easily. I approached the door and knocked softly.

“Hello? Belphegor? Are you awake?” I half-whispered, my face pressed against the door.

“Huh? What? Who’s there?” I heard him say from the other side of the door.

“There’s no time to explain. My name’s Syntania. I’m a human. I’m going to help you get out of there.” I have no idea why I blurted this next thing out: “Please don’t try to kill me.”

“What?” I could hear the confused tone in his voice.

“I have to go, just hang tight. I’m going to fix everything, I promise.” I dashed back down the stairs before he could answer. Just about the time I hit the bottom of the stairs, a shiver ran through my spine. _If I play this through the way it goes in the game…he’s going to kill me. Oh God, he’s going to kill me… Maybe since I know this already, I can plan ahead and avoid this. Wait. That’s chapter 16. That part of the story was confusing, I still don’t understand it completely. How am I going to plan for that? Okay, I need to think about this. One wrong step and the whole thing goes kaput._ As I was trying to work out all I had to do while walking back to my room, my stomach let out a huge rumble. _Holy crap, I’ve been so caught up in this whole rigamarole that I forgot about eating._ Just as I had that thought, my stomach cramped up, making me double over in pain. Once the cramp had passed, I decided that it would be prudent to make my way to the kitchen and find something hopefully edible. Once I reached the kitchen, I began digging through the refrigerator. Most of it was unrecognizable, but I did find something promising; about 5 pounds of ground meat that looked like beef _. I’m going to assume it’s beef for my sanity’s sake. I can’t eat this whole thing, but if I open it and don’t use it, it’ll go bad fast. Well, I’ll just make up the whole thing. Beel lives here, it’ll not go to waste. And I know how to extend it even more._ I searched through the kitchen to find more ingredients: breadcrumbs, eggs, dried onions, seasonings. I mixed the ingredients together and fired up the stove. Being in a hall, the kitchen had a separate griddle. I quickly fixed up one of my specialties, meatloaf burgers. It’s basically meatloaf mix but formed into patties and grilled instead of baked in a meatloaf. By the time I was done, I had made about 20 patties. While those cooked, I scrounged up lettuce, tomatoes, and fresh onions. I found a stack of cheese slices and managed to locate some buns. Even though my stomach was growling, I was cooking happily. The smell purveyed the kitchen, making me even more hungry. Soon I had everything prepared and ready to go. The cheese was on the patties and just about melted when I heard a noise behind me. 

“Food…” A low moan came from over my shoulder. I froze. _Beel. I sure hope he’s talking about my cooking and not me._ Slowly I turned around to see him hovering over me and the stove.

“Uh, hey, hi Beel. Yeah, I was hungry, so I came down to cook something. It’s just about done, you want some?

“Do you even have to ask?” he said. “The smell woke me up. It smelled so good I thought I was dreaming.”

“Oh, thanks. Well, there’s lettuce, tomatoes, and onions, and I think I saw condiments in the fridge. Rolls are over there. I’d like one, but the rest are yours. Have a seat at the table, I’ll bring them to you.” I grabbed a roll and made myself a burger, putting it aside so I’d get to eat it. Then, I put the rest of the patties on the rolls and shoved them at Beel. “Here you go, enjoy.”

*munch* *munch* *chomp* “Mmm, these are really good! I’ve never had burgers like this before.” He ate all 19 of them in record time. I watched him eat as I ate my own burger.

“Thanks. I’m glad you like them. They’re one of my son’s favorites too.”

He patted his stomach, grinning. “Thanks for the food, human.”

I smiled. “You’re welcome. And my name’s Syntania.”

“Oh, okay. Syntania.” He smiled again. “You’re a pretty good cook.”

“Thank you, I appreciate that.” I nodded.

“Mm, I’d better go back to sleep.” Beel got up from the table. “See you in school tomorrow, hum-I mean, Syntania.” He stretched and then made his way back to his room.

As I was cleaning up, I felt a twinge of sadness. _I really wanted to tell him about Belphie, but I can’t. Not yet. It’ll ruin everything. I really hope this works, or it’s not going to only ruin things for me, but for them as well._

Now that my hunger was satiated, I was suddenly overcome with drowsiness. I made my way back to my room to sleep. Tomorrow was going to be the day that I started everything in motion, make or break.


	8. I Need No Sympathy

When I awoke the next day, I went about my business. Checking my D.D.D., it seems that I had accumulated a decent amount of Grimm. I did my tasks and assigned the little D’s. We didn’t have school today, so it was the perfect day to start my plan. Then, I suddenly remembered that I went through a large amount of food. _Oh no. I should probably replace that. Ok, get a shower and get dressed. It’s time to go shopping. First thing’s first._

I left the HoL and made my way to the shopping district. First stop was the bank to withdraw some money. Next, I passed by Majolish. _Oh, yeah, I could use some new clothes._ I peered into the windows of the shop, checking out some of the clothes. _Great. They’re cute, but if I wear some of these things, I’m going to look like one of those pathetic middle-aged women who are desperately trying to hold on to their glory days by dressing like their teen daughters._ I sighed and resigned myself to take a look around to see if I could make anything work. My own personal style is weird. Think biker goth Stevie Nicks at a ren faire with a heavy sprinkling of comedy t-shirts. I was able to find a couple of boho style maxi skirts and peasant blouses that I liked, as well as a crocheted long vest and two nice maxi dresses. As I was looking at a really nice bell sleeve dress, I looked up to see Asmo checking out a pair of pale dusty pink leather pants. 

I called out just to be silly, “Those would make your butt look amazing!”

He poked his head up, then grinned when he saw me. “Ooh, you think so? I think so too! I’m going to get them! They are sooo cute!”

“Hey, you should get one of those skinny wraparound leather belts with the studs on them to go with those!” I added.

He gasped. “Yesss! That would look perfect!” He came over to me and took me by the hand to drag me over to the belts. “Come help me pick one out!”

I flipped through the belts and found a white one, it looked a bit complicated, like a harness/belt thing and held it up. “Like this?”

“Oh! Absolutely!” He snatched it out of my hand. “How about a shirt? What're your thoughts?”

I groaned. “You probably have a better idea of fashion than I do. If I chose the top, it’d be a white lacy ruffled shirt and a dark burgundy brocade vest, like rococo style. I think you’d look great in romantic fashion, but that’s just me.” I shrugged.

His eyes widened. “Do you think they have something like that here?” He dashed off towards the shirts, and I couldn’t help but shake my head and smile. I paid for my purchases and left, not really wanting to stick around as I still had a lot to do and I didn’t want to get railroaded into becoming Asmo’s personal stylist. As I walked down the street, a sign caught my eye: Hocus Pocus. I let out a little squeak of excitement. I had really wanted to come here and see what they had. Quickly I ducked inside. I love magic shops. They had all the usual supplies, incense, candles, stones, bath and beauty products, jewelry, books, etc. I particularly fell in love with a beautiful black cat statue. I wanted to buy it, but I didn’t know if I’d be able to keep it. I settled on some incense of different scents and a candle of protection. I happened to pass by a display counter that contained different pieces of jewelry, and something within caught my eye. A broach with a dark bluish stone in the middle. _It’s the midnight stone broach, the one Lucifer gives the MC during the party._ My mood suddenly shifted. _I’ll probably never get that broach or that party. Oh well, maybe I’ll just buy it for myself._ My eyes wandered over to the price tag and I about choked. _Holy shit! It costs that much?! I don’t have nearly that much money. I didn’t realize that he spent that much money on the MC. Now I’m sad._ After finishing up there, I slowly shuffled to the grocery store. Once there, I barely recognized any of the food products featured within. I glanced around in a semi-panic until I saw my saving grace; a food section entitled “Human Food”. Ecstatic, I ran over to the section and found everything I needed to replace, including a few extra things. I even found a package of cookies I liked and threw those into my basket. While I looked over some of the other human goodies, I heard a voice next to me. “Oh, you like human world food too?” The voice was unfamiliar, so I turned my head to look. The person speaking to me was a humanoid-spider looking demoness. She continued, “My daughters love that ‘macaroni and cheese’ stuff. I have to buy so much of it. Have you tried it too?”

I nodded. “Yeah, I have. It’s good.” I had the bad feeling that I should get out of here. “Well, have a nice day!” I said as cheerfully as I could muster as I made my way to the checkout. _If she had figured out that I was a human, her daughters would have more than just mac and cheese for human food._

The encounter with the demoness in the store reminded me that I am still pretty vulnerable here by myself in the Devildom. I made my way back to the HoL quickly, taking as many side streets as possible to stay away from the general populace. My first stop was the kitchen to put my groceries away, then I headed up to my room to put away my purchases. I decided to light one of the rose-scented incense sticks I had gotten, and soon the room was filled with sweet-smelling smoke. I sat down at the desk and opened the laptop. I had to finish my plan. It was difficult as I didn’t have my phone, so I couldn’t check the storyline, so I had to write down everything from memory. Solomon’s incantation, the quote from the murder mystery for Satan, and some other facts so I could get them straight. _I should try the incantation to see if it works. The MC used it after Solomon lends them their powers, but they were supposed to have powers anyways. If I can’t make it work, then I will fall flat on my face, and they’ll never believe me. How am I going to do that without raising suspicion? I also wanted to do the TSL thing. Let’s begin with that. I kind of want to watch it, and I think it’ll be a good bonding experience. Not the part where Levi tries to kill me, though._

I made sure the incense stick was completely out before making my way to Levi’s room. I knocked on the door and waited patiently. After a few moments, the door opened.

“Hey, Levi,” I smiled. “I was wondering if it would be okay if I could borrow your DVD of TSL. I felt like doing some binge-watching.”

He grinned. “Yeah, sure! I’ll go grab it for you.” He turned to head to one of the shelves, and a thought struck me. He returned with the discs and I said, “Um, if you’re not busy….would you be interested in watching it with me? It’d be great getting all the inside information since you know the series inside and out. I mean, you don’t have to if you don’t want to.”

“Uh,” Levi stammered, looking a bit embarrassed. “I just got this game from Akuzon that I was hoping to try out today. So, no thanks.”

“Oh.” My face fell. “No, I understand, it’s OK. It must be a really good game. I’ll watch this by myself, it’s cool. Maybe I’ll see if there are any behind-the-scenes extras on the disc. Thanks for letting me borrow it, Levi. I’ll return it as soon as I’m done.”

He glared. “You’d better not mess it up, human.”

I put my hands up. “Oh, no. One thing you should know about me, if I borrow something, I bring it back in similar if not better condition, or I replace it. It’s the right thing to do. Don’t worry; I’ll take great care of it.”

“Alright, you’d better. Maybe we can talk about it after you’re done watching.”

“I’d really enjoy that, Levi. Thank you.” I took the discs and headed back to my room. Even though I had hoped that Levi would watch them with me, I still decided that I wanted someone to watch them with. At this point, I only had one option.

Knock, knock. “Mammon? You here?”

“Whadya want?”

“Hey, you busy? You want to watch a movie with me?”

“Watch a movie? With you? What for? What’s in it for me?”

I sighed. I felt as if I was getting nowhere, and I was getting frustrated. I could feel my self-deprecation rising up.

“That’s OK, Mammon. Never mind. You’re probably too busy or too important or whatever excuse you want to use. I’ll just go watch this by myself. I just thought you’d really enjoy it.”

“Why? What is it?” He sounded like he was actually going to consider it.

“ _The Tale of the Seven Lords._ I’ve been meaning to see it.”

“Is that some of Levi’s nerd stuff? Ha! What makes you think I’d watch somethin’ like that? Especially with a human like you?”

My shoulders drooped. “My bad. I’ll just go. Sorry to bother you.”

As I turned to leave, the door burst open. “So, we gonna watch this thing or what?”

His sudden appearance took me by surprise. “I thought you weren’t interested in watching drivel like this with a mere human like me.” I said, annoyed.

He just shrugged. “As it is, I got some free time and I’m bored. Watchin’ a movie with you’s better than nothin’.”

I was still a bit upset. “Oh, but I don’t want to force you to have to be around me. Some of my human cooties might wipe off on you if you spend time with me.”

“Hey, you want me to watch this with you or not? Then shaddap and let’s go!” He grabbed my arm and started to drag me to my room.

“Careful!” I yelled, but allowed myself to be dragged, primarily so I wouldn’t fall flat on my ass. We managed to make it to my room with me remaining on my feet. Once there, I positioned the flat screen TV in my room so that we could see it. The only places to sit in my room was my desk chair and my bed, so I asked Mammon to grab some pillows and blankets from my bed and throw them on the floor to make a cozy little movie-watching area. I put the first disc of the show in and pressed “play”. The trailers began, and as I sat down on the floor, I didn’t feel floor. I heard a small “oof” and I realized that I was sitting in someone’s lap!

I let out a little squeak and scrambled to get back up. Turning around, I caught a glimpse of an orange mop of hair. I’d been so busy setting up that I hadn’t noticed Beel sneak in.

“Beel!” My face reddened. “OhmygoshIamsosorry!” I was so flustered that I said that all as one word. “Wait…why are you here?”

“I heard you two talking about a movie, and where there’s a movie, there’s popcorn.” He smiled. “Mmm, popcorn.”

“Yo, you sat in his lap!” Mammon started chuckling.

I glared at him. “You could have warned me that he was there.”

Mammon just shrugged. “I thought you knew he was there and was sittin’ in his lap on purpose. I ain’t one to judge.”

“Fine.” I just sighed. Pressing pause on the movie, I headed towards the door. “I’ll go make some popcorn. Don’t start the movie without me.”

“Nachos would be great too.” Beel nodded.

“Hey, how about some sodas while yer at it?”

I grumbled. “OK, ok, fine. I’ll go get it.” I made my way down to the kitchen and grabbed snacks; popcorn, tortilla chips and queso, some candy, a few sodas, and the pack of cookies I’d bought earlier. I found a tote bag and threw all the food into it. I grabbed a tray with handles, some napkins, and some paper plates. It was a bit heavy, but I managed to carry all of it back to my room. Dropping everything on the ground with a huff, I exclaimed, “Food’s here!”

“All right! You ain’t all that bad for a human!” Mammon said as he grabbed a soda and one of the bags of popcorn. I managed to grab another soda and a pack of red licorice before Beel snagged the rest of it. I pressed “play” again and the show began.

It was a bit slow at first, but as we watched, I could feel myself getting more and more invested. _This is a good story, Levi was right!_ It was about the second disc that I noticed Mammon begin sniffling. I took a glance at him and he was enraptured by the movie, tears starting to well up in his eyes. 

I looked over at him concerned. “Hey, you OK?”

“Yeah. Yeah.” He nodded, obviously upset. “It’s just….the Lord of Fools found his one true love’s body frozen in the snow! He looks so heartbroken!” *sniffle*

By disc 5, he was full-out sobbing. Beel grumbled, “Mammon, quite cryin'. Your nose is running.”

“But it’s so saaaad!” Mammon wailed. 

“Awww…” I couldn’t help but say. Instinctively, I put my hand on the side of Mammon’s head and gently guided it to my shoulder, my other hand rubbing his back. He responded at first, putting his arms around me in a hug. I stroked his hair for a moment in a comforting gesture, until he bolted upright, pulling away from me.

“Hey! Whaddya think yer doin'?”

“I-I’m sorry. I thought you’d want a hug.”

“Y-yeah, well…” He glanced over at Beel, who was paying attention to the movie, happily munching on some popcorn. “I mean, that wasn’t half bad. You can do that again.” He lay his head back on my shoulder, still sniffling, and I stroked his hair as we watched, rocking back and forth slightly. Beel glanced over at me, catching my eye, then scoffed, rolling his eyes, and went back to eating and watching.

We managed to watch all of the movies and started on some of the extras when we all finally dozed off. Sometime after that in a half-asleep daze, I dragged myself off of the floor and into bed, covering up with what blankets remained.


	9. Because it's Easy Come, Easy Go

I woke up later than I had wanted. As I stretched, my arm hit something. It was then that I realized that I could not really move. I sat up, trying to figure out in my half-sleep stupor what was going on. Apparently, I was not the only one who had crawled into my bed to sleep. Beel was on my left, by the wall. He was on his side, facing me, and softly snoring. Mammon was on my right, on his back.

 _Oh shit oh shit oh shit….._ I gingerly crawled over the sleeping demons until my feet hit the floor. Quietly I tiptoed to the door, turning the knob carefully trying my best to not make any noise. As I slipped through the door into the hallway, I realized that I had just snuck out of my own room. _Damnit._ I stared at my door for a few, trying to figure out what to do.

_Wait, this is MY room…_ I threw the door open and barged in. Striding over to my bed, I put my hand on Mammon’s shoulder, shaking him awake.

“Hey! C’mon! Wake up and get outta my bed!” I shook him hard until he started groaning and moving. 

“What the hell, human? I was sleepin’…” he trailed off as he started to doze off again.

I shook his shoulder again. “I said, get up! If you don’t move, I’m gonna cover your head with frosting and tell Beel that you’re a giant cake pop!”

“Ugh….” He groaned and finally rolled out of my bed. He blinked a couple of times, then looked around. “Wha…? Where the hell am I?”

I put my hands on my hips. “You fell asleep in my room. In my bed.”

“Wait….” Mammon put his hands up in front of him. “We didn’t….did we?”

I blinked. “No. Oh hell no. We didn’t do what you’re insinuating. I’m married, and I don’t even like you like that.”

“Hey!” he sputtered. “What’s wrong with me? I’m the GREAT….”

“I know, I know, the GREAT MAMMON, blah, blah, blah.” I finished his sentence. “What makes you so damn great, anyways? Great at accumulating massive debt? Congrats to you and 1.6 billion of the human populace.” I sighed, pinching the bridge of my nose. “Look, if you have to tell people that you are so great, then you are just trying to convince yourself because just saying it isn’t going to convince anyone. ‘Deeds speak louder than words.’ Ever heard that?”

“I…uh.” He looked stunned.

“Look, Mammon. Don’t you get tired of your brothers ragging on you all the time? They really care about you, but you do stupid shit like stealing from them and basically acting like an ass. No wonder they give you crap.”

“But…” He stared at me, mouth agape.

“Mammon. Believe it or not, I actually want to help you. I feel kind of bad for you because of how hard your brothers are on you. But, right now, I’m in wrinkled clothes and my breath smells like nacho cheese and ass. I want to go shower and brush my teeth and I am not going to do that while you and Beel are in my room. So, could you please do me a favor and take him and leave? If you do, I’ll come to you later and do what I can to help you. I might look like an overweight leprechaun, but I like to think I’m pretty wise about life and shit.”

“O-okay.” He walked over to Beel, still asleep on my bed, and woke him up while I grabbed my robe and a change of clothes and walked to the bathroom. I showered and changed into clean clothes and returned to my room. Thankfully it was empty. I set about cleaning up the mess and packing up the DVDs to return to Levi.

I knocked on Levi’s door, and when he opened it, I handed the DVDs back to him with a smile. 

“Thanks, Levi. I really enjoyed the movies. Here’s your DVDs, just like you gave them to me.”

Levi blinked in surprise. “Uh, wow, thanks. You liked them, huh? Maybe later we can talk about them! That’d be fun!”

I smiled. “I’d love that. I’m sure you have some insight on the story that I don’t. I’d enjoy hearing it.”

“Great!” he nodded. “I’ll text you later, okay? I gotta go. Raid’s starting.” Before I could respond, he shut the door in my face.

“Um, ok. That’s cool, Levi.” I sighed. 

I was getting nowhere with Levi. Come to think if it, I was getting nowhere fast with anything. _What do I do? I need to make this go as fast as I can, but if I skip crucial steps, I might be stuck here forever. I need someone that I can talk to about this._ I could only think of one person who might understand what’s going on.

 _I hope this works._ I knocked on the door.

A voice came from within. “Yes?”

“Hey, Satan, are you busy? It’s me, the human, Syntania. I was wondering if I could talk to you.”

“Give me a moment.” The door opened, and there stood the blonde demon, his green-blue eyes narrowing as he sized me up. “Why did you want to speak to me? I thought Mammon was assigned to be your keeper. Shouldn’t you be bothering him?”

“You know as well as I that your brother isn’t exactly the sharpest crayon in the box. I need to speak to someone with some knowledge.”

“Hm,” he muttered. “Very well.” He opened the door and motioned me inside. “Come on in.”

I entered Satan’s room and looked around in awe. The scent of bookbinding leather and old parchment reminded me of all the time I had spent at the library growing up. There were so many books, I could not help myself. A sense of wonder came over me as I read the spines. I brushed my fingers gently over countless tomes.

Satan must have noticed my admiration. “I take it you like books as well?”

“Oh yes, I do.” I continued to look over the massive library. “I’ve been reading since I was two. I’ve read so many books…fiction, non-fiction, reference. I even like to write a little. These are amazing. Some of them are so old, I’m afraid to touch them…Oh, I’m sorry.” I put my hand down and turned my attention to him. “I’m sure you didn’t ask me to come in just to gawk at your collection.”

He grinned. “Actually, I appreciate the fact that you seem to enjoy books almost as much as I do. You said you had questions?” He took a seat in his chair.

“Yes.” I took a deep breath to steel my resolve. “Do you believe in multiverse theory?”

He arched one slender eyebrow. “Well, that was an interesting question. Now, what exactly what do you mean by multiverse theory? Are you talking about that infinite dimensions exist where they are exactly like ours but with one small change or completely different, or that each decision made spawns a new dimension?”

“Well, both, I suppose. Do you believe they exist, or that it’s just some delusion?”

“It’s always a possibility. I haven’t seen conclusive evidence that the idea doesn’t exist.” He stated in a very factual manner.

“What if I were to tell you that I came from an alternate dimension?” I said.

His expression changed. “Then I’d say that you were quite possibly insane.”

I was going to have to convince him. “But, even though you say that you think it’s a possibility, once presented with an opportunity, you dismiss it so quickly without proper research or even consideration?”

His look became pensive. “I see. You make a valid point. Where’s your proof, then?”

“I don’t have any physical proof, but I do have something that might convince you. Let me explain.” I sat down in a chair across from him. He leaned forwards, his arms resting on his knees, in rapt attention. “In the dimension that I come from, this,” I swept my arm in an arc around me. “All of this, the Devildom, everything…it’s a game. A mobile game, one you play on your phone.” I patted my hip. “If I had my phone, I could just show you, and it would be easier to convince you.”

“We’re just a game to you?” He scoffed.

“No, no, no!” I shook my hands. “That’s not what I meant! This whole world is a game. The player, the MC, is a young anime-type character of indiscriminate gender who gets summoned to the Devildom and has to complete a year at RAD. They meet you and your brothers and…” I trailed off, feeling myself start to blush. “Oh, uh…. they…make….um…oh. They make you and your brothers…fall in love with them. It’s a romance game.”

Satan was giving me the strangest look. “Excuse me? A-a romance game?”

“Yeah. I get the feeling I just blew what little credibility I had.” I dropped my chin to my chest.

“Mm.” He nodded. “It is hard to believe. I don’t have an interest in you like that.”

“I know.” I nodded. “It’s still early in the game for that, but still, this is me we’re talking about. I’m far from the cute, big eyed barely legal anime protagonist these games usually feature. Trust me, I don’t hold any dreams of being adored like that. I’ve given up on those delusions years ago. I just want to figure out how to go home.” I sighed sadly. “I just want to go home to my family, and I need your help in figuring out how to do that.”

“Well, either you believe your delusions strongly enough that they are real to you, or you are telling the truth. Your reactions are genuine. I am apt to believe the latter. You do not necessarily strike me as someone who is mentally ill. I must say, I am still not thoroughly convinced. You said you have information that may convince me.”

I nodded. “I do. I’ve played the game to the end; I know the story. That means, if I am correct, then I have knowledge that I should not feasibly have. Like, for instance, I know the circumstances of your birth. That even though you are considered the fourth-born due to your power, you were actually born last, born of Lucifer’s rage.”

A stunned look spread across his face. “What? How do you know that? Who told you?”

“I told you, I have knowledge that I shouldn’t have. I know that’s why you resent Lucifer. You feel as though you are stuck in his shadow. I know that is why you try so desperately to separate yourself from him, to prove that you are more than just a part of him. You are more than just a part of Lucifer, Satan. You have earned to right to call yourself your own demon.”

“I-“ His face grew cold. “There’s no way you could know that-“

“Unless I was telling the truth. That in my world, this is a game. And I know the story. Do you believe me now? Or do you want more? I know about…” My eye fell on a specific tome. “That book, given to you by the witch Grizelda that allows two people to switch bodies by touching it. I know about Lilith. The sister that died. I know…” I had to stop myself, I had almost revealed Belphie’s whereabouts. “…a lot more, some of which isn’t important right now. The important part is, will you help me? Please? I’m thinking that this is like the game in a game scenario, that I have to win the game to be able to exit.”

Satan was apparently shaken from what I had just said. “If what you say is true, if we assume that you are correct in your assumption, then what is the endgame scenario? What do you have to do to win?”

“One important step is I have to make pacts with all of you. I’ve already gotten Mammon, but I need the others.”

“And what exactly will that accomplish? Belphegor is in the human world, so until he returns, you won’t be able to make a pact with him.” I just nodded, knowing that wasn’t the case, but also knowing that I can’t tell him the truth yet.

“I only need the ones that are here. Please, Satan, I’m begging you, I need your help. You’re the most intelligent and knowledgeable of your brothers; you’re my best hope to get home.”

“All right, I’ll help you. But, let me get one thing straight. I’m not doing it for you, but because I’m curious to see what this is all about. Don’t think I’m going to jump into a pact with you because of this either. I’m not that simple to win over.”

“Understood and agreed. I won’t ask that of you, just your help.” I held out my hand for a shake. He grasped my hand, firmly but gently, and gave it a couple of shakes. 

“So,” he asked. “What do we do first?”


	10. Little High, Little Low

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Plans are made and a little more bonding time with the second-oldest.

I spent the afternoon with Satan, laying out a plan that will hopefully end with getting me back home. I had to choose my words carefully to not give him too much inside information. But, having him as a brainstorming partner gave me better focus and a renewed brightness. I felt more confident with my chances having him help me rather than trying to muddle through it by myself as I had been before. I mentioned the plan to get Levi to make the pact. Satan thought for a moment and frowned.

“A trivia contest?” He shook his head. “And that worked in the game? Levi was so upset that you bested him that he tried to attack you, and Lucifer stepped in and rescued you? Hm. That seems a bit farfetched if you ask me.”

I nodded in agreement. “Oddly enough, I was able to beat Levi because of advice that you and Beel gave me on how to make him upset. And depending on the choice, Solomon or Simeon provides the trump card to send Levi over the edge.”

“Beel and I…?” he said with a confused look. “Ah, I see.” He chuckled. “It’s a bit of a guilty pleasure for us demons. We enjoy tormenting each other. Demonic sibling rivalry, I suppose you could say. You mentioned you know how to win against Levi, correct?”

“Well,” I said sheepishly. “If you go with Simeon as a choice, you are told about a spoiler in the latest chapter of the manga, but you aren’t given the precise information. So, I do not know the actual details of the plotline per se, but if I ask Simeon, he will probably tell me. If I went with Solomon, he has a limited-edition necklace that Levi wants. I think the plot info would probably be the best option. I’ll have to talk with Simeon.”

“That is your first step then, I think. The angel would be more trustworthy than the sorcerer. Go and talk to him then come back and tell me. After you return, we’ll plan out how to set up the contest.”

Before I could reply, there was a loud banging on the door.

“Oi! Hu-Syntania, you in there? Levi said he saw you come in here! Satan! Is she in there with you? Hey! Answer me!” Mammon called out from the hallway.

Satan and I looked at each other, and simultaneously groaned and rolled our eyes. 

“You’d better tell the moron that you’re in here or he’ll pound on my door all day.” Satan sighed.

“Hold on a second, Mammon. I’ll be right out.” I yelled back. 

“I should go. Thank you for everything, Satan. You’ve been a huge help to me.” I smiled.

He smiled back. “I’m not finished with you. You are not home yet, so there is still more to be done. Come back here when you’re sick and tired of the idiot.”

His words made me chuckle. “I will. Thank you. I-I really don’t know how I’m going to repay your kindness.”

He raised an eyebrow with a devilish grin. “What makes you think I helped you out of kindness? I like having people owe me favors, and you are going to owe me after this is all said and done.”

“Ohboy.” I chuckled nervously. “Hurray…” _Why do I have a really bad feeling about this?_ I went over to the door an opened it, coming face to face with a somewhat agitated white-haired demon.

“Took ya long enough.” He peered suspiciously over my shoulder at Satan. I turned to look as well, noticing an impish grin on his face. I tilted my head, puzzled, as Mammon growled.

“Hey, back off, Satan, this human’s mine. Get your own!” Mammon grabbed a hold of my upper arm, pulling me out into the hallway.

Satan grinned and casually waved. “See you later, Syntania. We still have unfinished business to attend to, remember. Try not to break her, or lose her in a game of cards, Mammon.”

Mammon responded by slamming Satan’s door, grumbling as he half-dragged me down the hallway towards his room. I responded by digging my heels into the carpet to stop his forward motion. My strength was no match for his, but the resistance was enough to make him pause.

“Hey! What gives?” Mammon grumbled.

“Stop for a second, would you?” I pulled my arm free, but his grip slid into just holding on to my shirt sleeve instead. “What is this about? Where are you dragging me to?”

“My room,” he huffed. “You said…you promised to help me. You not gonna now?” He looked dejected.

“Oh. Yeah. I did, didn’t I? I’m sorry. There’s a…thing…I needed help with, and Satan was the only one who…”

“Huh?” he frowned. “What’s Satan got that I don’t? I should be the one you come to if you need help!”

I folded my arms across my chest. “Ok, then, how much do you know about multiverse theory and alternate dimensions?”

“Multi-whozawhatzis?”

“My point exactly. Mammon, I appreciate your zeal, but there are some things that you can’t help me with.” I sighed. “Can we continue this in your room? I hate having conversations out here in the hallway.”

“Oh, uh, yeah. C’mon.” He put his hand on the back of my upper arm to guide me to his room. 

I took a seat on the couch after clearing some trash off of it. “Mammon, you really should think about cleaning your room. It’s a literal hot mess. Kinda gross, actually.”

“Eh, I got more important things ta do.” He shrugged, taking a seat on the couch next to me. “So, what’s all this about you wantin’ to help me? You gonna give me some money or somethin’?”

“No, I don’t have a lot of money to begin with, especially since I went shopping not long ago.”

“You went shoppin’ and you didn’t ask me to go? I love shoppin’, especially if it’s for me.”

“That’s why I didn’t ask you. Like I said, I didn’t have a lot of money, and I wanted some clothes. I also bought some groceries. I don’t have the money to spend on you, so you can forget about that.”

Mammon huffed. “Then how you gonna help me?”

“I don’t know, advice? Someone to listen to who won’t just call you stupid? I guess I did not really think it through too much. I just…. you looked like you needed a friend. I wanted to help. It’s in my nature, I suppose.” I shrugged my shoulders. “I just think that your brothers are a little too hard on you sometimes, and I wanted to let you know that you have someone who cares—even if I am just an ordinary human.” I managed a meek smile.

“Huh.” He furrowed his brow. “So, uh, why d’ya care about me? Other than because I’m the Great Mammon, of course. I mean, is there something else?” I could see his cheeks start to pinken up slightly behind his yellow sunglasses.

“Because,” I chuckled. “Even though you act like a big lunkhead a good portion of the time, I can tell that you are a good man. I can see that you love your brothers, although you steal shit from them all the time. You really need to work on that, by the way. You are loyal to and protective of those you care about, and those are admirable traits. And you are kind of fun to hang out with. At least with you it is never a dull moment. I also think it’s kind of cute how possessive you are. It makes the object of that possessiveness feel kind of special.” I reached out and patted him on the shoulder, then rubbed it a bit in an affectionate manner. “Although it makes me think that this ‘I AM THE GREAT MAMMON’ stuff all the time is not so much for everyone else, but maybe trying to convince yourself. You don’t have to, you know. For what it’s worth, I think you’re pretty great.” I smiled warmly at him.

“I…uh…” Mammon’s cheeks had turned a dark crimson now, so much so that I could feel the heat radiating from his face. “Ya do? Th-thanks, Syntania.”

“It’s all good.” I held out my arms for a hug, letting him make the decision. He only hesitated a moment before he leaned forward, scooting close to me, his hip touching mine. I wrapped my arms around him tightly, letting him rest his head on my shoulder. He slid his arms around my waist and placed his hands onto my back. I gently stroked his hair, and after a moment, I heard him sigh and his body relaxed into mine. I found myself gently rocking him back and forth like a mother rocking her infant, but instead of mother and child, it was human mother and centuries-old demon who never had a mother. I could smell the scent of his skin and hair as I held him. The scent was not what I had expected. Citrus fruit and summer flowers. I heard him softly murmur, and he buried his face into my shoulder. We sat there, embracing for a long time until I released him and started to pull away. As I did, I smiled at him when I caught his glance. Something must have been miscommunicated, though, because he started to lean forward again, not for another hug, but more like he expected a kiss. I leaned back in shock, and put my hand up, my fingertips on his mouth.

“Uh, no. None of that. I have a husband, sorry.”

“Oh, uh, yeah…. you mentioned that. I kinda just got carried away with the hugging and stuff. You’re really good at hugging, ya know. It was…nice.”

“Hugs always make me feel better, so I thought one might help you too. Do you feel better?”

“Yeah,” he nodded. “That helped. So, uh, if, I wanna do this again, you’re OK with it, right?”

I sighed and smiled at him. “If you need me, Mammon, just ask. I ain’t going anywhere anytime soon, it seems. I do need to get back to Satan soon, though. Maybe he’s got some ideas for me.”

“Yeah, well,” Mammon grumbled. “Just remember who ya have a pact with, okay? I’m gonna walk ya back to your room now. C’mon.” He stood up and offered me his hand this time, instead of grabbing my arm like he had before.

As we headed back to my room, I turned to him and asked, “Hey, by the way, I gotta know…how’d you get that car all the way up there?”  
  



	11. Take Me Where the Wind Blows

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Syntania is given a revelation on how things really are.

It was halfway down the hallway to my room when I froze. Realization had hit me like a ton of bricks. 

“Mammon.”

“Yeah?”

“Did-did you try to kiss me?”

“Huh?” He turned to look at me, a confused expression on his face.

“Did. You. Try. To. Kiss. Me?”

“I…uh,” He blushed, stammering. “W-why you askin’?”

“Answer the question, please. Did you try to kiss me?”

“Um…yeah, maybe.” His voice was barely audible, and his face turned a bright red.

“But why?” I blinked. Something in my brain had snapped. I just could not comprehend the thought of a handsome, endearing, centuries-old demon lord had wanted to kiss me. I felt as if my mind had seized.

“Uh…wha?” Mammon had that deer in the headlights look.

“Why would you want to kiss someone like me?” I furrowed my brow. “I’m not attractive. You are like so much hotter than me. You could do better than me, even if I were single.”

“Oi, hold on a minute!” He started to get upset. “What makes you think all I care about is looks? You really think I’m that shallow?”

“I—” It was my turn to blush.

He sighed, then growled. “Here’s your room. I gotta go.”

 _I fucked up! Shit!_ “Mammon! Wait!” Before I could continue, he was gone. I groaned, entering my room, and shutting the door behind me. I was so distracted that I did not realize that I was not alone. 

“You spent enough time with that idiot.” Blue-green eyes narrowed as he spoke. “I was waiting for you to return. I have managed to get that trivia contest organized for you.” Satan was sitting on the edge of my bed, waiting for me. He held up a stack of papers. “Consider yourself fortunate. I was just about to leave here and leave you to your own devices.” 

“Satan. Please don’t.” I held my hand to my forehead.

He frowned. “If you do not want or need my help, then just say so. I don’t want to waste my time.”

“Nononono…That’s not it.” I sighed sadly. “I’m sorry, Satan. I just made a huge mistake.”

“Did you put your chances to return home in jeopardy? I would not be happy to discover that I have done all this work for nothing.” His mood darkened considerably, which frightened me a bit. The last person I would want to make angry would be the Avatar of Wrath.

“No. I wish it had been something like that. That would have been easy to fix. I think I upset Mammon.”

“How would you upset him, take away his credit card? Catch him stealing your belongings?” He chuckled.

“No…it’s a long story. Look, can we talk about something else? You said that you had the contest set up? What else needs to be done?”

“Don’t change the subject. What did you do to Mammon?” Satan suddenly sounded a bit angry. I was startled by his shift in tone. _Regardless of how they feel about each other, they are brothers. This should not be too surprising._

“All right. Fine.” I took a deep breath. “I was trying to help Mammon. We hugged. And then…he tried to kiss me. I told him no.”

Satan glared. “He was upset about that?”

  
“No.” I shook my head. “It wasn’t until after that when he was walking me back to my room. I guess, the realization of what had happened did not actually hit me until that moment. I asked him why.”

“Why what? Why he tried to kiss you?”

“Yes. I told him that he could do better than me. That he was much more attractive than me. He accused me of thinking he was shallow and got angry. I-I didn’t get a chance to apologize before he stomped off.”

“I see.” Satan said. “I understand why he’s upset with you.” He nodded.

“Why? I mean, if you understand, can you explain it to me?” I pleaded.

“It would take quite a bit of lengthy explanation but suffice it to say that we demons perceive you humans differently than you perceive each other. Think of it as some animals being able to see outside of the usual spectrum of light. Therefore, what you humans might consider as attractiveness is irrelevant to us. We tend to focus more on a person’s character. If Mammon did indeed try to kiss you, it was most likely because he is attracted to you as a person, your personality. Something you do or have done fulfills a need or needs within him. However, that may have changed if you have managed to upset him as much as you claim to have.”

“Oh. Ohhh. Oh shit. I really did fuck up, didn’t I? Damn it!” I clenched my fists and thrust them downwards. “I just, I don’t know. It’s so hard for me to fathom that someone is attracted to me because I’ve been messed with so many times before. I couldn’t accept that he….fuck!”

“You stated that you are married. Obviously, someone finds you attractive.” He crossed his arms. “You really should go speak to Mammon and get this straightened out. He is integral to this plan of getting you home. If he is angry with you, that won’t happen.”

“You’re right, Satan. Thank you for explaining that to me. I’ll try to remember. I should go find him now. I hope that I can get this fixed.”

“You have the benefit of the pact with him. Speak the truth to him; he’ll be able to feel your sincerity, and that will aid your cause.” He rose from his sitting position on my bed and walked to the door, opening it for me. “Hurry.”

I nodded and walked into the hallway. He followed behind me, stopping in front of his door. “Good luck, Syntania.”

“Thanks.” I nodded and continued on my way to Mammon’s room. As I walked, the words Satan said kept rattling around in my head. _“Demons, on the other hand, when we form attachments, it is because we are attracted to the person themselves.” So, it really did happen. It really was me. Whoa. This feels so weird. Unless…it was that way because that is the way the game is set up. They are going to fall for the MC regardless. Wait, no. Did the game ever mention how beautiful or attractive the MC was? Did the brothers ever compliment the MC’s looks? They didn’t mention it, did they? Maybe……just maybe, Satan’s right?_

 _And if he’s right, then…could…Mammon have actually kind of sort of fallen for me?_ I couldn’t just dismiss the idea. I was frankly getting tired of second-guessing. I need to find a path and stick to it. First things first. Fix things between Mammon and myself. I took a breath to steel myself and knocked on his door.

“Yeah? What?”

“Hey, uh, Mammon, it’s me, Syntania. Can I…um, talk to you for a moment? Please?”

“No. I don’t wanna talk to you.”

“Please? I’m begging you. Mammon, I’m sorry. Satan explained some things to me, I didn’t know. Come on, please? Open the door. I don’t want to talk through a door. My hearing’s crap, I might not understand you.”

There was silence for a few minutes, then footsteps. The door flew open , and there he stood, looming over me, an annoyed expression on his face. 

“Talk. Ya got 45 seconds.” He grumbled.

“I’m sorry. I truly am. I’m just not used to someone liking me for me. I figured that for any of you brothers to like me, I’d have to be some young cute slip of a girl with huge boobs and a tiny figure.” I closed my eyes, my head drooping downwards. “I’m…not…happy with my looks. I feel ugly most of the time. I have dreamed of being beautiful for as long as I can remember. I don’t get hit on. I don’t get stared at. I get ignored.” I couldn’t believe that I was here confessing my feelings to someone that I had barely known, but the moment I started talking, it just all flooded out. “I get laughed at and ridiculed. I try not to care, and most of the time I can ignore it, but…” I could feel the tears welling up in my eyes, trying so hard to keep my composure. “It hurts. I feel like I’m invisible, like my appearance is some affront to the world. Some days I just want to curl up somewhere and hide forever. I’ve tried not to focus on that aspect, to focus on the rest of me. It’s gotten better over the years, but it still manages to surface from time to time like raw sewage bubbling up from the ground. I…” I had to stop. I felt like crying. There was so much that I was going to say, about my life and my past, but I forced myself to be quiet. I just had one more thing to say.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you or hurt your feelings. Please forgive me.” I hung my head low, my chin on my chest as I stared at the ground, afraid to look him in the eye.

There was silence. A ball of fear formed in my stomach. _It didn’t work. He hates me. I’m screwed._ Then the shadow at my feet moved. I felt something. Mammon’s hands on my arms, wrapping around me. My head pressed against his shoulder, my cheek against his chest. That scent of citrus and flowers. He was hugging me. That’s all it took. I could feel the tears burst forth like a broken dam. I cried there in his arms. He said nothing, just held me, rocking me as I had once rocked him. I couldn’t stop it, the pain just spewed forth. My breath came in choking sobs.

“Shh…” he whispered. “It’s ok, it’s ok.” He patted my back softly as I bawled. After a moment he pulled back, looking down on me with a grin. He grabbed his sleeve with his thumb and used it to wipe my messy face. That caused me to chuckle a bit. 

“Hey.” He said once my weeping had subsided. “Don’t cry no more. I hate to see ya cryin’. Look. It ain’t about your looks. You humans actually look different to us demons. You see, we can see inside ya too. You know what ya look like to us? Besides food, that is.”

That caused me to laugh, ending the flood of tears with a few sniffles. “No, what?”

“You, for instance. You got a good soul. It’s bright and shiny, like a big diamond. There’s a few little black speckles and red streaks, but I seen worse. Much worse. For the most part, you’re a good person. You remember what Lucifer said about nice and shiny souls? That’s what ya look like. The body’s just a box. Looks pretty much the same to us. Souls like yours, though, us demons are drawn to them like moths to a flame. So I don’t wanna hear any more of this ‘I’m so ugly’ shit, okay? Because your soul’s beautiful.”

I stood there, dumbfounded. His words had made the pain subside. “You-you really think so?”

“Course I do!” Mammon laughed. “Whadya think, I made all that shit up that I just said? Now get back to your room and clean up! Your face’s all red!”

I could feel more tears coming, but these were happy ones. “Thank you…” I whispered.

“Don’t mention it. Seriously. I mean it. I don’t want my brothers thinkin’ I went soft or somethin’. They’ll never let me hear the end of it.” He smiled and caressed my cheek. “Go on now. I’ll talk to ya later. But…” he held up a finger, waggling it at me. “If you need anything, you’d better only come to me! You’re my responsibility while yer here!”

I nodded, laughing. “Ok. If I need something, I’ll ask you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: This was a difficult chapter to write as it hit a very personal note for me. I've struggled with self-esteem and body issues all of my life.


	12. Doesn't Really Matter to Me

I had to prepare for the trivia contest. That included going to speak with Simeon to get the trump card from the unreleased 9th chapter. I made my way over to Purgatory Hall and managed to find his and Luke’s room. Knocking on the door, I called out, “Hello? Simeon? Are you in there? It’s me, one of the human exchange students, Syntania. Can I talk to you?”

The door opened, and to my surprise, I could look forward instead of upwards like I normally did. I’m only 5’2”, and the brothers are all so much taller than I am, I felt like I was going to get a cramp in my neck from looking upwards all the time. The person at the door was closer to my height.

“Oh! Luke! Hello! Is Simeon here?”

Luke shook his head. “No, not right now, he’ll be back shortly. Is there something I can help you with?”

“No thank you. I need to ask him a question, it’s a bit important.”

Luke opened the door wider and smiled. “Would you like to come in and wait for him? I’ll be expecting him back soon.” He waved me inside.

“Oh, uh, okay, thanks!” I entered and took a seat in a nearby chair. 

Luke looked at me oddly. “I’m sorry, but have we met before?”

_Oh no! I hadn’t been introduced to them yet!_

“Someone pointed you out. I haven’t had a chance to introduce myself. You are Luke, one of the angel exchange students from the Celestial Realm along with Simeon, right? I think someone mentioned that you work directly under the Archangel Michael.”

Luke brightened considerably. “Yes, I do! Oh, I’m so glad that someone here appreciates that. I hope we can be friends! What’s your name?”

I smiled. He was just too cute. “I’m Syntania, from the human realm. Nice too meet you!” I held out my hand for a shake. “I’ve never met a real angel before!”

He grinned even wider, a faint blush spreading across his face. “Nice to meet you too, Syntania! Well, I hope I didn’t disappoint!” He smoothed his clothing with his hand.

“You know, someone mentioned that you make the absolute best desserts. I’d love to sample one sometime, if that’s all right.” _Yeah, I’m schmoozing a bit, but the more people I can have on my side, the better. Besides, he seems like a nice enough kid, although maybe a bit misguided._

He began practically bouncing at that point. “Oh! That would be wonderful! I’d love to make you something sweet! Actually, I kind of want to go do that now! I’ll be back later! Bye!” Before I could say anything else, he dashed out of the room.

I just sat there, feeling a bit awkward. _Uh, what do I do now?_ I just began looking around the room. It was nice, maybe a bit sparse compared to my room and very neatly kept. I was starting to get a bit bored, so I pulled out my D.D.D. and took care of a few tasks. After a few minutes passed, I heard the door open, so I turned to face that direction.

“Luke? Is that you?” The person at the door was not Luke, but a very surprised-looking dark-skinned, dark-haired tall angel.

“Hello, who are you?” Simeon smiled warmly.

“Oh, I’m Syntania, the human exchange student."

“Oh yes, I’ve heard about you! You’re causing quite the buzz in the academy. I’ve been hoping to meet you.” He entered the room, closing the door behind him.

“Actually,” I rose from the chair. “I came here to ask you for a favor.”

“Oh?” He tilted his head slightly to one side, “How can I help you?”

“Well, I have a bet with Levi that I am a bigger TSL fan than he is, and I was told that you know what happens in the so far unreleased 9th chapter. If you would be so kind to tell me, I’d be grateful.”

“Ah, I see.” He chuckled. “You seemed to have acquired a lot of information in such a short time here. Very well.” He proceeded to tell me about the major plot points of the unreleased chapter. I grabbed a notebook and wrote frantically, making sure to get down as much as I could.

After he was finished, I asked, “I am curious, Simeon. How did you come upon this information? Are you friends with the writer?”

He gave a coy smile. “It’s a secret.”

“I thought angels don’t keep secrets. Isn’t that against the rules or something?”

He raised an eyebrow. “A secret is only a sin if it contains sinful thoughts or actions or can cause harm to someone. The methods of which I came upon this information is not sinful or harmful.”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to offend.”

“No offense taken.” Simeon nodded. “I hope the information I have given you will help.”

“It will. Thank you. I’ll be going now. Please let Luke know that I had to leave.”

“Yes, of course. Please come back and visit us again soon.”

I left the room and made my way back to the HoL. Now that I had my information, and Satan said that he had organized the contest, it was time to challenge Levi. I managed to catch up with him in the hallway.

“Hey, Levi!” I called out.

He turned, glancing over his shoulder at me. “Yeah? What do you want, normie?”

I smirked. “Let’s have a competition to see who the biggest TSL fan is!” 

Levi stared at me incredulously. “What?! Where did that come from? Do you seriously think you could beat me in a competition involving TSL?! That’s hilarious!” He started laughing loudly. “As if I’d accept a challenge like that. I mean, I already know what the outcome would be.”

I just stared him down, still smirking, my hands crossed over my chest. “Yup. You’d lose. That’s what would happen.” I said in the cockiest tone I could muster.

His mouth gaped open. “Excuse me? Did you process anything I just said? Where are you getting this idea that I might actually lose to you?”

“Think about it, Levi.” I laid the attitude on thick. “I know how big of a TSL nerd you are. Why would I do something stupid like challenging you, of all people, if I didn’t think that I could win. You think all I did was binge-watch the series? Oh, no, I’ve done a lot more preparation for this than what you know. But,” I smiled. “If you are afraid that you are going to lose to me, you can just admit defeat now and declare me the biggest TSL fan. Or, we can do this competition, and I can humiliate you publicly.”

I could tell he was starting to get angry now. “Excuse me? EXCUSE ME?! Are you processing ANYTHING I’m saying here?!”

“I’m processing all of it. And all I’m hearing is that you are afraid that a ‘normie’ like me is going to thoroughly kick your ass. But, I guess you’re just too chicken…”

“Hey! Watch what you say, human!” His eyes flashed. 

_Uh oh, just keep your cool, it’s OK. You can do this. Deep breath._

“No, it’s OK, Levi. Just crawl back into your room and hide, and everyone will laugh at you because you backed down from a mere human.” I said in a flippant tone, hopefully disguising the rising panic I felt in my stomach.

He clenched his fists so tightly that I could hear them click. I prepared myself to run in case I had pushed things too far. He then took a deep breath.

“Fine. If that’s what you want, I’ll do it.” _Success!_ “I accept your challenge. We’ll compete to see which one of us loves TSL more, you or me.” He narrowed his eyes and wiggled his pointer finger at me. “Just one thing, though. If you lose, you might never make it back to the human world **alive**. But you still want to do this, right? Okay.” A smile spread across his face.

I nodded. “Great. Defeat you later.” I made my way back to Satan’s room to give him the good news. 

“Come in, Syntania.” I heard him call from the other side of the door.

I burst in excitedly. “Satan! It worked! Levi took the bait! The trivia contest is on, and I have the trump card from Simeon. Once this is done, I can get Levi to make a pact with me and that is one more step complete.”

“Hm.” He nodded thoughtfully. “That is good news for you. As I said before, I’ve already got the contest set up. Everyone will be there. Asmo has agreed to host, I’ll be doing color commentary, and Lord Diavolo has requested to announce. Lucifer is going to be judge. Beel is going to be there, for some reason. He probably will think we’re serving snacks. And Mammon will be there and useless as usual. We’ll hold it tomorrow after school.”

I was taken aback. “Wow. All this for a trivia contest.”

Satan smiled. “It gets boring here sometimes. This adds a little excitement, and news travels fast around here. In fact, things have been more interesting since you came. I suppose I should thank you for that.”

“Uh, you’re welcome, I guess.” I shrugged. “I’m not trying to make things interesting; I’m just trying to survive intact long enough to get home.”

“Inadvertently or purposefully, the result is the same.”


	13. Mama, Just Killed A Demon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Trivia Showdown and the Aftermath

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know the chapters have been slow coming, but my real-life obligations and a bit of writer's block have made it hard. I hope this will be worth the wait.

After school, I arrived at the student council hall where the trivia contest was being held. I had expected just the brothers, and maybe Solomon, the angels, and perhaps even Lord Diavolo.

I got a lot more.

I could hear a faint buzz coming from the council hall as I got nearer. I broke out in a cold sweat as soon as I entered. It looked like the entire school was here! I could feel the rising panic in my chest. I stood in the doorway, frozen. Satan and Mammon must have noticed the panic on my face and came walking over to me.

“Oi! Syntania! Ya look like you’ve seen a ghost!” Mammon smirked, covering his mouth with his hand.

Satan’s brow furrowed. “Are you all right?”

I took a deep breath, then shouted, “What the hell? I thought this was going to be a small thing, not a school-wide assembly!”

Mammon shrugged. “News travels fast. A human challenging one of us is a big deal, I guess.”

We made our way over to the podium. Everyone else was waiting. I took a seat on one of the chairs to keep from collapsing.

“Hey,” Mammon plopped a hand on my shoulder. “Ya look real nervous, ya know? There’s no shame in losing to Levi. I mean, he is king of the nerds. Nobody’d look bad on ya if you totally flopped. I mean, ya only binge watched the show once, and Levi eats, breathes, and sleeps TSL.”

I sat, blinking. I could feel my panic rising.

Satan turned to Mammon, frowning. “What’s gotten into you, Mammon? You’re acting very oddly,” Satan paused. “Did you bet against her or something?”

Mammon began to sputter. “I…but…uh………maybe.” He glanced down at the floor. “I-I mean, Levi’s like the biggest nerd ever! She’s just a human! It seemed like a sure thing….” His voice trailed off.

I glanced up at Mammon, hurt. “Wow….gee, thanks.”

Satan just shook his head. “It’s all right, Syntania. You’ll do fine. Remember the trump card.”

I nodded. Mammon looked confused. “Hey! What’re ya talking about?”

Satan glared at his brother. “No need for you to worry about it. She needs to get ready, it is almost time to start. I have to go over by Asmo to do commentary,” He pointed a finger at Mammon. “Don’t try to spook her anymore. There’s much more at stake than your Grimm.”

I took a few deep breaths to try to calm down as I heard Diavolo’s voice announcing the beginning of the contest. Mammon was pacing behind me, muttering to himself. I could make out, “gonna kill me” and “call off the bet”. I tried to focus, running the plot of TSL through my head to make sure I remembered as much as possible. I heard my name called, and I took a deep breath, and made my way up to the podium beside Levi. He had a big grin on his face. _Well, it is nice to see him so confident for a change,_ I thought. _Too bad I have to ruin that._

The contest began, and Levi and I each took our turns answering questions. As I had expected, I was getting the simple questions and Levi the insanely hard ones. Then it was my turn to bring out the big gun. I took a deep breath and proceeded to recall everything Simeon had told me about the unreleased volume 9. I could see Levi growing more enraged out of the corner of my eye, and I began to get a bit nervous. I knew what to expect, but that did little to quell my growing fear.

“Wh…what…? NO! That’s insane….the Lord of Masks wouldn’t do that to the Lord of Shadow. Lies, all of it! Pure hogwash! Don’t think you can fool me by making up random stuff like that!” Levi screamed. His face grew red and I could see his hands clenching into fists. A cold sweat broke over me as I prepared to run for my life.

Diavolo just nodded. “Hmm. Actually, Syntania doesn’t appear to be lying as far as I can see.”

“Levi, you know as well as I do that Lord Diavolo has the ability to discern whether someone is telling the truth.” Satan interjected.

“B-But…no…! Everyone online has been talking about how the Lord of Masks and the Lord of Shadow are going to totally make up…What you said CAN’T happen, It…it just CAN’T!”

Just as Asmo said, “I suppose that settles who the true TSL nerd is…” I heard a terrible growl come from Levi.

“I won’t stand for this. All you did was stay up one night marathoning the DVDs. The idea that someone like YOU could actually be a bigger TSL fan than me, it’s….No… **no** , I WILL NOT STAND FOR THIIIIIS!” As Levi bellowed the last word, I saw his form shimmer, coral-like horns sprouting from his head, his clothing shifted, a serpentine tail emerging from his back and thrashing about like an angry serpent. My eyes widened, and I heard Mammon yell, “Uh-oh…! Syntania, run! Get out of here!”

I turned to run just as I saw Levi lunge for me. Eyes glowing reddish-orange, fangs bared, claw-tipped hands reaching out for me, ready to rip me to shreds. Even though I had expected this, it still scared the crap out of me. I hadn’t expected him to be so frightening. “Ohhhhh SHIT!” I screamed.

Through the chaos, I saw a white streak heading my direction. _Mammon….he’s too far away. I hope Lucifer can reach us or I am absolutely dead._ I hadn’t been paying attention where I was running to. In my panic, my foot hit the step of the stage, sending me flying onto the ground. I landed hard on my right hand, and a bolt of pain shot up my arm. I looked up to see Levi over me, his hands mere inches from my throat, then a red and black blur shot in between us, and Levi was yanked backwards. I saw his expression go from rage to confusion as he flew back. 

“That’s enough… I believe you were going to settle this via a QUIZ, weren’t you? Not through violence.” Lucifer’s baritone voice reverberated throughout the hall. I looked up to see him in his demon form looming over us. “You’re out of control, Levi.”

“L…Lucifer.” Levi stammered.

As the adrenaline coursing through my body began to dissipate, the pain in my wrist flared up. “AAAHOOWW!!” I screamed, clutching my wrist to my chest. Mammon knelt down next to me, a look of deep concern on his face, looking at my arm. “Hey, what’s up with you?”

“Oh, I don’t know, I just felt like randomly yelling! I’M IN PAIN, DAMNIT!” I yelled angrily at him, tears rolling down my face. “I landed wrong on my hand and I messed up my wrist. It hurts like hell!”

Lucifer kept a hold on Leviathan as he spoke in a calm tone. “Levi, go back to your room and cool off.” Levi just stood there, fuming. 

Then, Diavolo interjected, a warning tone to his voice. “Levi? You heard what he said….. _right?_ ”

Levi grumbled, “…Yeah.”

Satan made his way over to me, his brow furrowed. “You’re injured?”

I could only nod. Mammon looked up at him. “Hey, Satan, bug off. I got this.” He held onto my upper arm, trying to help me to my feet. “She’s my human, I’ll take care of her.”

Satan frowned. “You’re the last demon I would trust to take care of yourself, much less a human.”

“Oi! What’s that supposed to mean?” Mammon shouted.

“What about your bet? You lost.” Satan said flatly.

“I…uh….well…I’ll take care of that, don’t you worry about it!” Mammon kept a hold onto me as I stood up.

Asmo asked, “So what about the competition? How are we supposed to have it without Levi?”

“I suppose,” said Diavolo, “That means it’s a draw. Neither one of them won.”

“C’mon,” Mammon said as he held me up. “Let’s get ya back to yer room and take care of that wrist.” Satan followed behind, musing, “It’s interesting that Lucifer came to the rescue of a mere human, isn’t it, Mammon?”

“Huh? What’re ya asking me for?” Mammon said.

“No reason.” Satan shook his head. “I’ll catch up to you later, Syntania. I’m going back to my room to do some research.” I thought for a moment I saw an evil grin dance across his face as Mammon walked me back to my room.

I sat on the bed while Mammon attempted to bandage my wrist. I winced every time he moved. Beel had joined us as well, leaning against the wall and watching.

“How’d ya manage to fall on yer butt? Seriously, could you be any more of a klutz?” Mammon sputtered as he fumbled with the bandage.

“You humans really are way less physically capable than us demons. That’s because they don’t eat enough. And unlike us, they don’t eat the right things.”

Mammon grumbled, “Stop tying everything back to food, Beel! Actually, why’re you even here anyway? Seems to me that you’ve been spendin’ an awful lot of time here ever since the night of the DVD marathon.”

Beel retorted, “Well, so have you. I mean, you’ve even left a cell phone charger here. And a toothbrush, too. That’s how much you’re over here.”

Mammon stammered, “W…well that’s because, uh…you know…I’ve gotta look after this human, don’t I? It’s my job…”

“OW!” I screeched. “Hey, watch it! Focus, will ya?” I said to Mammon. “That hurt! And you're wrapping it all wrong. It's far too loose, and you need to make it go over here more.” I pointed out where he had missed.

“Hey!” he yelled back. “I’ve never had to do this before, OK? I don’t know how it works!”

“She’s right,” Beel said in between bites. “That’s a terrible job. Mmm, nothing beats pizza for a midnight snack.”

“You think YOU can do it better, Beel? How about you try then…..hey, is that MY slice you have in your other hand?” Mammon said.

“You know, I could go for a soda right now.” With that, Beel was off to the kitchen.

“Hey! Put my slice down, Beel! HEY!”

I sighed. “You can have mine, Mammon. I’m not hungry.”

“What’s up with you? Why are you all gloomy and stuff?” Mammon asked.

“I don’t know, it’s just….seeing Levi and Lucifer in your demon forms, it just reminded me that you guys actually _are_ demons. I got….scared. I really thought I was going to die.”

“Ah…um, by the way…There’s somethin’ I want you to know. Listen. The next time your life’s in danger, I’m gonna be the one to save you, all right? Don’t you forget that. And if I can’t manage to save ya, then make sure you die, got it?!”

I blinked, staring at him in amazement. “Wait. Hold the phone. Let me get this straight. My options are, let you save me or death. Am I hearing this right?”

“Uh, yeah! That’s what I said!” Mammon folded his arms across his chest.

“Seriously.” I stared at him incredulously, then just shook my head and laughed. “I care a lot about you too, Mammon.”

“What? I…uh…I didn’t say that!” Mammon sputtered, blushing deeply. “I just don’t want ya being rescued by anyone but me!”

That just made me laugh again. “You remind me of this old song by 10cc, ‘I’m Not In Love.’ “ I then proceeded to sing the first few lines of the song:

_I’m not in love,_

_So don’t forget it,_

_It’s just a silly phase_

_I’m going through._

_And just because_

_I call you up_

_Don’t get me wrong,_

_Don’t think you’ve got it made._

_I’m not in love,_

_No, no._

That made him blush even more, hiding his face behind his hand. “N…no, that ain’t it! Uh…you’ve got a really nice voice though.”

I smiled. “Thank you.” It was about then that my D.D.D. rang. I pulled it out of my pocket to look. Levi! I sighed and nodded, knowing what came next. I was still apprehensive about meeting him, having seen a taste of his true power. “Hey, Levi’s just texted me to meet him, I’m going to go talk to him. Stay here and try to behave, ok?”

“No way! I’m coming with you!” Mammon insisted, but I put my hand up. “Please, stay here. I’d rather go by myself. I’ll be fine, don’t worry.” I didn’t want to give him a chance to argue again, so I quickly left out of the door.


End file.
